Would-be St. Louis MLS investor Jeff Cooper on the league's $50 million expansion fee:
"We're not going to pay so much...If they're unreasonable with the price, we can go elsewhere".
The 'elsewhere' being referred to is USL 1. If he's able to sell the county, city, state and his fellow investor's that they should shell out $573 million for the mixed-use stadium complex for a minor league team, someone in Obama's camp should get this cat on a flight to Denver immediately. If he can sell that, he can sell anything.
12 comments:
Anyone who spends five minutes looking at both leagues will know that USL is a cracker jack league. Yes there are teams with good attendance numbers (Montreal, Portland, Rochester), and yes the level of talent isn't that far below MLS, but realistically there is no comparison.
The St. Louis people would be making a huge mistake to forego MLS expansion plans over the (relatively) small expansion fee. Though it would also eliminate one of the competitors for Portland's MLS bid...so in that case my message to Jeff Cooper is: Join the USL, it's a fantastic league with teams in such fantastic locations as Rochester, NY and Cary, NC! There might even be a team in Kitsap, WA next year! Some teams even draw over 3000 people per game!
1-MLS expansion fees, given the current state of the game, are too high. I base that on my highly expert econometric analysis, which consists of reading mostly soccer blogs and Gawker.
1a-This is great news, because it is pricing St. Louis out of the equation! MLS, meet your new mistress: her name is Portlandia!
1b-The last thing our fledgling league needs is Kansas City #2.
I, for one, am glad that the assumption that St. Louis is "definitely" the next expansion franchise is dying away. Jeff Cooper, for all his enthusiasm, doesn't have enough money to own an MLS team, given the league's current economics. Collinsville, for its willingness to spend ridiculous sums of money, is simply not St. Louis. It would be Frisco all over again but without the growth projections. And finally, St. Louis, for its part, isn't a very attractive market in my mind. It is a relatively small media market that already has teams in the NFL, MLB, and NHL. Fans only have so many entertainment dollars to go around.
Now that St. Louis seems done, let's move onto to better prospects: Montreal, Portland, and Vancouver.
BTW, SF, you had me at "Cooper." I feel a post with the prefix "Franken" coming on, any day now...
I think to dismiss St. Louis as a poor expansion location because of the current presence of the Cardinals, Rams, and Blues is a conclusion brought about by poor logic and lack of research.
St. Louis is steeped in soccer tradition, with four St. Louis area players in the '48 Olympic team and five in the 1950 England beating squad. The St. Louis Stars also were a charter member of the NASL. Not to mention St. Louis University's work in the college ranks.
Not to mention the high levels of immigration from Central and Eastern European countries and the footie traditions they bring with them.
St. Louis could support an MLS team; it's just a matter of getting a leadership group in to place who have some idea of what they're doing. If they want to build a stadium and bring it to quarter capacity with USL games, then they have no idea what they're doing. That stadium will end up being used by Collinsville for concerts and whatever else they opt to fill it with.
not to get all "pc" or nothing but isn't St. Louis asking for trouble by having some dude holding a cross crusader-style on its logo? I can already here all the complaints from non-christians, secularists, haters, etc...
=p= is obviously from St. Louis.
The city is currently the:
18th largest metropolitan area.
21st largest media market.
Tradition is one thing, money is entirely another. The MLS, as any other major sports league, is little interested in tradition when selecting expansion franchises. It is all about how the new expansion can help increase the value of the brand. In the case of St. Louis, or Collinsville if you want to be more specific, the potential economic benefits do not make it a no-brainer as Philly was.
If the league can get a lucrative Canadian TV contract, as the Globe and Mail's Ben Knight hinted today, then I think Vancouver and Montreal will join the league. If not, I'd be willing to bet on Portland (it PEG Park is renovated and soccer-specific) and one of the Canadian cities.
USL in St. Louis is as good as getting an MLS side. I'd love to stand here and say that MLS is soooo much better and we as season ticket holders should be proud of paying a premium on tickets for the incresed quality we see.
That's totally not the case. In many matchups, I'd pick the USL side to beat an MLS team, and I've seen enough of both to know what the hell I'm talking about. MLS has a long way to go before it can say they bring true benefit and value to those that invest in them.
Seriously, it's not like the ROI on a club is as short as it should be to ask for such a premium.
If St. Louis starts with a USL side and is able to get funding for a stadium anyway, the league will come around and knock on thier door.
50 million is way too much considering that's what AEG sold the Metrostars for in the bigest market in the country.
It's worse than extortion. It's a stupid frachise model that does not work.
Cooper has the investors MLS wants him to have. He stated in a recent article that "...the roster includes four or five single investors based locally and internationally." Cooper did not say the "can't" pay the fee, he said they "won't" pay it. Cooper has been jerked around by MLS over the past two years as they have continually moved the bar that needs to be jumped in order to get a franchise. This is just his way of saying "enough is enough, we've done what you asked, now make a decision"
As far as the crest goes, it is one of the best looking crests in the league and any minority that is "offended" by it can go cry in the corner. I'm tired of everyone in this country always being concerned about offending someone even if it is only a small group of people. It's ridiculous! Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but the minority should not be making the rules.
And for the anonymous poster comparing Collinsville to Frisco. Collinsville is 8 miles from downtown St. Louis, and you can see the Gateway Arch from the development. It is also near the intersection of 2 major interstates, so getting to the stadium for anyone in the metro area will not be a problem.
And if you hadn't figured out by now I'm a St. Louis supporter.
How far away is the stadium development from the strip clubs in East St. Louis? I was under the impression that was the only reason most guys from the St. Louis area head east of the Mississippi was to check out places like Larry Flynt's Hustle Club (awesome place by the way, check out "Pixie").
Collinsville seems far enough removed from East St. Louis' troubles...
Dear =p=:
dude, are you kidding? who gives a rat's tail about what happened in '48 or nineteen frigging fifty?? It has as much relevance to the success of an MLS team as Abe Lincoln's underwear...fact is there is no record of STL ever being a good soccer ticket buying market. Player developing area - hell yes it does! but not where it counts and that's fillin' da seats. I can't even remember a big soccer match hosted in the land of Belgian Bud since....since...well, hell, since 1948.
And JC has no juice. My money says no TIF money ever goes toward a USL stadium.
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