Is it time to hit the pause button on this soccer thing?
This city is getting ready to make a run at a Major League Soccer franchise and booting baseball out of PGE Park. That would mean building a new baseball-only stadium somewhere else. You know all about that, by now.
But I doubt a lot of folks in this sleepy little burg — Soccer City USA, you know — are paying much attention to the sad state of the MLS. ESPN has pulled the plug on the Thursday night MLS game of the week, preferring now to attempt to move the games to different times of the week, hoping better lead-ins will aid ratings.
The ratings are embarrassingly bad. And getting worse. This league, in spite of all the high hopes, is being ignored in record numbers. Last season, the TV ratings for these games were 0.2, with an estimated 253,000 people – yikes! — watching the games nationally each week. Those “Snuggy” infomercials would get better numbers. Even worse, many of the games featured shots of vast patches of empty seats in the MLS stadiums.
Is this an investment this city wants to make?
Soccer, small-town Portland | Dwight Jaynes | January 20, 2009
What’s wrong with the status quo of the Beaver’s and Timbers….
I understand that the biggest sports leagues in the nation, and the world, are driven by television revenue. However, it’s not enough to argue that a lack of television revenue means that MLS is not viable. My understanding is that at least at the soccer-specific parks, attendance is driving the league.
Perhaps if the MLS aspired to become the NBA of world soccer, handing out 7-year, 95-million dollar contracts, then major, major revenue would be necessary. However, the best the MLS can really hope for is to be a second-tier league in the world. With salaries more in line with the Beavers than with the Blazers, the MLS may be viable long-term.
It would be unfortunate to move the Beavers out of Civic Stadium, but nothing stays the same.
Dwight, you seem pretty selective with the facts you present. Yes, the TV ratings for soccer in the US are low. But when you look at the attendance figures, things don’t look so bleak.
From the few times I’ve glanced at MLS games, it’s pretty clear that a lot of teams are around the 20,000 range when it comes to average attendance. That’s not bad. There are certainly more than a few MLB teams that don’t get that many people in the seats.
There’s certainly no guarentee that the MLS would be successful in Portland—or anywhere in the States. Soccer here is simply a second-tier sport. However, if the game can draw solid crowds in places like Columbus, Kansas City and Salt Lake, I would certainly think Portland can at least match that support for a team.
I also recently read somewhere that a few teams in the MLS are even turning a profit. That doesn’t sound like a league on the decline to me, especially considering how deep in red they were during their first few years. Yes there’s still struggling franchises, but aren’t there a lot of NBA and MLB clubs losing millions also??
Just because soccer will never be a top-tier sport in the States doesn’t mean that there’s no place for a professional league. For all its flaws, the MLS has certainly proven that there is.
If it’s a poor business decision then: “Yes, of course, Portland wants to do it. That’s how we roll.”
I wouldn’t read too much into the TV ratings, unless Paulson et. al. have that written into their business plan as a revenue stream.
That said, has anyone actually seen their business plan?
soc-cer?
Come on people. The point of paying attention to tv ratings is that it points to the long term viability of the league. Why boot the baseball team from PGE and building a baseball only park to have MLS come here then fold three years down the road. Face it folks. Folks outside of MLS cities in this country don’t give a rat’s you know what about soccer. Sorry. I mean, 200+ thousand? That isn’t bad, it’s terrible. The worst show on cable will have 100-150,000+ viewers who are watching by accident.
HOW DO I GET THOSE RATINGS ANYONE? HELP ME?
“From the few times I’ve glanced at MLS games, it’s pretty clear that a lot of teams are around the 20,000 range when it comes to average attendance. That’s not bad. There are certainly more than a few MLB teams that don’t get that many people in the seats.”
Average MLS attendance in 2008 was 16,459. Average MLB attendance was 32,516.
The problem is, no matter how successful a Portland franchise in the MLS might be, it’s far from a sure thing that the MLS will be able to stick around long term.
And even if it does, just how successful would a Portland team have to be to make payments on a revamped PGE Park? And what happens a few years down the road when Paulson, or a subsequent owner, decries the lease, saying “the economic model is broken?”
If payments for yet another refurbishing of PGE Park depend on the presence of the Timbers in the MLS, it leaves the city with no negotiating clout when an owner threatens to move unless he gets a better deal.
Dwight, how do you explain the success of four cable channels that are exclusively soccer-specific?
You make a big leap in your logic. So you conclude that because ESPN puts MLS on an even lower pecking order…. that MLS will fail?
Are we talking about the same ESPN network that brings us such quality television entertainment as poker, morning shouting matches involving Stephen A. Smith and Skip Bayless…so they pull the plug on MLS. I say big deal.
The Pac-10 has a horrible television contract in both hoops and football and that’s without ESPN, and they do just fine in attendance, they survive, despite ESPN blowhards claiming the SEC is the end all be all, and they go-on and on & say the Pac-10 is horrible every year.
Major League Baseball, ESPN, jams the Red Sox and Yankees down our throats and despite that most teams do just fine in attendance.
But I would bet some MLB teams face worse financial challenges than MLS. First of all, the Yankees and Red Sox spent something like 500 million in contracts this winter. I wonder how many big name sponsors are going to pull out, or go belly up. It’s a matter of time. At the very least they don’t renew their luxury suites. Citi Group, the same company the feds bailed out is putting their name on the Mets new stadium…. the same Mets owner that lost a fortune with a guy named Bernie Madoff. That is insane. I have no idea how they balance their budgets.
MLS teams average like 2-3 million in total team salaries! In fact, some players make less than minimum wage at 18K per year. That seems to be more in line to survive a tough economic climate. That’s a relative bargain compared to CC Sabathia and Barry Zito who rake in over a combined 300 million to throw a little ball.
Isn’t Portland Mayor SCAM Adams a big supporter of all of this? He hopefully won’t be in office for very long as he needs to resign now or face recall in June.
Actually the sad state in this town has always been minor league baseball. Putting 2-3 thousand people into a big stadium gives it the feeling of a live gravesite. Un less your a diehard baseball fan, nobody really cares…
Put the beaver in a small park where they belong. A compact stadium will make this game atleast more exciting for some
MLS actually will get to experiment with different days and espn and get a chance for better marquee matchups. It has 6 more years left on it’s current ESPN contract and that is plenty of time to find a steady audience
I don’t think a league that asks for a 40 million dollar entrance fee and easily is getting is quite worried about what you think Dwight (do they even know you exist?) They are a fiscally responsible league (unlike MLB baseball) and they have a salary cap. Moreover, let’s face it, PGE park is better suited for college football and Major league soccer. Minor league events like triple A baseball just don’t fit there. Never have, never will
Seattle sees the big picture and already has there team in place. When Portland joins them, it will be an instant rivalry and one the fans here will go to in droves
Pastimes are all well and good, but the Timbers and soccer work the best not only for the city, but also for events at PGE park. We are soccer city and deserve the highest league in the USA
It’s a no brainer and a great opportunity. I am excited for the city
Does Portland have more important things to spend millions on right now?
That question answers itself.
16k attending a professional sports event is horrific for a top 30 market like Portland.
When UO and OSU football can each pull 45k+ on the same day, 70 and 100 miles from Portland respectively, it proves that there is a market for a product that is actually in demand.
Professional soccer is not in demand in North America. It’s just not. If Paulson wants his ballpark and MLS team, make him ask daddy moneybags for a check (you know, the former CEO of Goldman Sachs and also former US Treasury secretary Paulson), NOT my property taxes.
I’m a huge soccer fan, but I find most MLS games unwatchable due to the astro-pitches many play on. It’s like watching indoor soccer or baseball in a dome. Aesthetically and functionally ugly. On the flip side, the soccer-only MLS venues that are being built are fantastic. They look good on tv and are fun to visit.
And considering that these days we have access to live games in the English Premier league, La Liga, etc. it’s hard to want to watch a much lower level of the sport even if it’s domestic. (I don’t see a lot of triple A baseball or D-League basketball games garnering big audiences either.)
Simply put, comparing the MLS to other major US leagues is apples to oranges. Think of the MLS more like the early days of the major US sports franchises. What if we’d garnered an NFL team like Green Bay did back in the day? No way that area gets a pro football team today. Consider getting a current MLS franchise as getting into the league on the cheap. Someday it won’t be. The quickly changing demographics of this country will affect the popularity of individual sports. The growing latin and asian influence in the US bodes well for soccer in the future.
Soccer will, though, continue to be resisted by the old guard sports writers who don’t understand the game and don’t want to. Which is undertandable to an extent because they are of a generation that was much more monocultural then the younger generations of today.
Enticing a new stadium to Portland is like asking to be extorted in the future.
If the venture succeeds, the denizens will say the venue is too small and threaten to leave unless bigger and better facilities are built.
If the venture fails, they’ll leave the taxpayers paying for something they never needed in the first place.
If a professional team wishes to enter the Portland market, then they’d better be able to pay their own way, with their own revenue, and leave the taxpayers out of the the formula entirely.