General MLS Discussion

[Fantazma]

its a very weird format they are proposing, the biggest issue is congestion. especially with the leagues cup makes this idea insane to me.

colombia has something kinda similar. They have a regular season of 20 games, each team plays each other once (home or away) and then the top 8 qualify to a second round. Two groups of four and each team plays an extra 6 games. The winner of each group face each other in a final series of two games ( home and away). This is done twice, "Apertura" and "Clausura"

 

[Sabo]

The expanded playoff format would work best in a 30 team league if they shortened the regular season to 28 games. Home and Away against everyone in your conference (which reduces the crazy travel in MLS today). We meet Western Conference teams only in special events, playoffs, US Open Cup, Leagues Cup. Like the AL/NL used to be. They could probably throw in a couple of all intraleague games Saturdays to make it a 30 game season and still accommodate international breaks.

 

[sbrylski]

The expanded playoff format would work best in a 30 team league if they shortened the regular season to 28 games. Home and Away against everyone in your conference (which reduces the crazy travel in MLS today). We meet Western Conference teams only in special events, playoffs, US Open Cup, Leagues Cup. Like the AL/NL used to be. They could probably throw in a couple of all intraleague games Saturdays to make it a 30 game season and still accommodate international breaks.

Agree, I do think they could cut a few games just to give some breathing room, I just think its unlikely they would voluntarily cut games from the schedule. I suppose they did recently cut games from the playoffs, but then immediately turned around and went massively the other way.

28 games works well for a 30-team league -- two conferences, three divisions of five teams each; x2 v division (8 games), x1 v conference (10 games), x1 v two divisions of the other conference (10 games).

30 games works well for a 32-team league -- two conferences, two divisions of eight teams each; x2 v division (14 games), x1 v conference (8 games), x1 v one division of the other conference (8 games)

 

[Fantazma]

The expanded playoff format would work best in a 30 team league if they shortened the regular season to 28 games. Home and Away against everyone in your conference (which reduces the crazy travel in MLS today). We meet Western Conference teams only in special events, playoffs, US Open Cup, Leagues Cup. Like the AL/NL used to be. They could probably throw in a couple of all intraleague games Saturdays to make it a 30 game season and still accommodate international breaks.

might get that 30th team soon.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1585825734131535872

 

[JCMore]

might get that 30th team soon.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1585825734131535872

Just what we need, another team in Southern California

 

[adam]

might get that 30th team soon.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1585825734131535872

 

[Fantazma]

Just what we need, another team in Southern California

the other option was norhtern california with sacramento. the vegas bid seemed to have died down.

 

[413Blue]

Just what we need, another team in Southern California

To be fair. We have two teams in NY metro, Philly is 90ish miles away, DC and Boston are each 200 miles or less away.
San Diego is 120ish miles from LA.

 

[Seth]

I don’t know much about Sacramento but I’d think San Diego would be a better choice, maybe population-wise but certainly as a destination to go to.

 

[KevinJRogers]

Agree, I do think they could cut a few games just to give some breathing room, I just think its unlikely they would voluntarily cut games from the schedule. I suppose they did recently cut games from the playoffs, but then immediately turned around and went massively the other way.

28 games works well for a 30-team league -- two conferences, three divisions of five teams each; x2 v division (8 games), x1 v conference (10 games), x1 v two divisions of the other conference (10 games).

30 games works well for a 32-team league -- two conferences, two divisions of eight teams each; x2 v division (14 games), x1 v conference (8 games), x1 v one division of the other conference (8 games)

I'm sure the midnight oil is burning bright as they pore over the calendar. mgarbowski and the ESPN guys have a point when they talk about schedule congestion, especially when you factor in the long-distance travel.

And we can't play in January at all; maybe we can in the last week in February and the first week in December. At best. So, realistically, we're looking at a nine-month window. It might not be possible to do it with a 34-game regular season.

Anyway, we'll have to wait see what's in the actual proposal, I guess. I'm sure if we've all thought of this stuff, so have the suits.

And remember, the league owns the teams. Player contracts are league contracts. It's in the league's interest financially as well as morally to protect the players. Not only do they not want to get anyone hurt, but they also wouldn't want MLS to become known as a low-money, high-burnout league.

Especially now with us just starting to get some grudging respect (and I do mean just starting LOL).

 

[KevinJRogers]

Some interesting comments from Don Garber yesterday. Nothing particularly Earth-shattering, but it's easy to see the strategic thinking at play: The league is all about leveraging the Apple deal and the World Cup to get to the next level. Which only makes sense.

One particular line in the Register Citizen story (it's AP) stood out to me: "MLS will earn at least $250 million per year on the [Apple] deal, but Garber said he doesn't see the increased revenues affecting the league's roster rules moving forward." That surprised me a little. But maybe we should mentally put a "for now" at the end of that sentence.

MLS Open To Playoff Revamp: Garber

Garber hails record number of MLS players set to play at World Cup

Garber sees linear TV deal, expansion on MLS' horizon

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Even though Major League Soccer begins a groundbreaking 10-year...

www.registercitizen.com

 

[sbrylski]

Some interesting comments from Don Garber yesterday. Nothing particularly Earth-shattering, but it's easy to see the strategic thinking at play: The league is all about leveraging the Apple deal and the World Cup to get to the next level. Which only makes sense.

One particular line in the Register Citizen story (it's AP) stood out to me: "MLS will earn at least $250 million per year on the [Apple] deal, but Garber said he doesn't see the increased revenues affecting the league's roster rules moving forward." That surprised me a little. But maybe we should mentally put a "for now" at the end of that sentence.

MLS Open To Playoff Revamp: Garber

Garber hails record number of MLS players set to play at World Cup

Garber sees linear TV deal, expansion on MLS' horizon

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Even though Major League Soccer begins a groundbreaking 10-year...

www.registercitizen.com

I'd imagine much of the increased revenue is going to cover the increased costs in producing the games in-house.

 

[ZYanksRule]

I'd imagine much of the increased revenue is going to cover the increased costs in producing the games in-house.

The league has absolutely no idea what it's getting into broadcasting all these games without the help of 28 regional sports networks. It's going to be pretty rocky at the start next year.

My over-under is 3 years before they come crawling back to their regional sports networks begging for mercy.

 

[Fantazma]

The league has absolutely no idea what it's getting into broadcasting all these games without the help of 28 regional sports networks. It's going to be pretty rocky at the start next year.

My over-under is 3 years before they come crawling back to their regional sports networks begging for mercy.

i dont want to go back to black outs, or having to stream games on YES because games get bumped from actual channel.

 

[Fantazma]

Some interesting comments from Don Garber yesterday. Nothing particularly Earth-shattering, but it's easy to see the strategic thinking at play: The league is all about leveraging the Apple deal and the World Cup to get to the next level. Which only makes sense.

One particular line in the Register Citizen story (it's AP) stood out to me: "MLS will earn at least $250 million per year on the [Apple] deal, but Garber said he doesn't see the increased revenues affecting the league's roster rules moving forward." That surprised me a little. But maybe we should mentally put a "for now" at the end of that sentence.

MLS Open To Playoff Revamp: Garber

Garber hails record number of MLS players set to play at World Cup

Garber sees linear TV deal, expansion on MLS' horizon

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Even though Major League Soccer begins a groundbreaking 10-year...

www.registercitizen.com

they have to increase the roster if they doing all these group stage playoffs and also the leagues cup. or else teams will probably not even use main players in leagues cup for example or won't go for it since they know a big amount of games will occur after that tournament.

 

[413Blue]

The league has absolutely no idea what it's getting into broadcasting all these games without the help of 28 regional sports networks. It's going to be pretty rocky at the start next year.

My over-under is 3 years before they come crawling back to their regional sports networks begging for mercy.

I doubt it. They may have some struggles in year 1, but they are moving towards the global standard of in house world feed's that most other league's (in soccer) have gotten sorted out. It's a big project, but with $250m or more per year on the line, they will figure it all out.
Also, in some/many cases, the team employed the production teams and supplied the RSN and the feed for the away club I believe it was a Revolution insider who said the production crew was still unsure of the future, but they expected to continue under the new deal. So at least some experienced crews will carry forward.

 

[ZYanksRule]

i dont want to go back to black outs, or having to stream games on YES because games get bumped from actual channel.

I think what's going to happen is the league will realize what a massive undertaking this is and will contract with the RSN's. They'll take on productions as it's always been and be allowed to televise the games. In return, the games will also still be available on Apple.

 

[413Blue]

I think what's going to happen is the league will realize what a massive undertaking this is and will contract with the RSN's. They'll take on productions as it's always been and be allowed to televise the games. In return, the games will also still be available on Apple.

Something tells me Apple has $250m reasons to object to that.
It's a huge project, but I'm sure MLS will pull it all together. Yes, there will likely be times in the first year where things look terrible, but again, many RSN production crews already work for MLS, or are freelance people who will gladly work for the new project. Many of these people have been working MLS matches for years. They will carry forward plenty of experienced staff members.
It's not as though these RSN's were having their full-time baseball crews work MLS on the side and now these people are unavailable. They were mainly stitching together freelance crews who will still be available for freelancing or sub contracting out to people who will still be available for sub contracting.

 

[Joe_Cos]

The league has absolutely no idea what it's getting into broadcasting all these games without the help of 28 regional sports networks. It's going to be pretty rocky at the start next year.

My over-under is 3 years before they come crawling back to their regional sports networks begging for mercy.

The only problem is RSN as we know it might not be a thing in 3 years. Sinclair who owns majority of the RSNs took a bath when it paid $10B for them. SBJ, has stated that Sinclair might sell the RSNs and the potential buyers will be NHL/MLB and NBA buying the RSN, if a sale is not there a bankruptcy filing of the SPV Diamond Sports Group will occur. So the better chance is the rest of the leagues will follow MLS model.

 

[adam]

One worry I have is that MLS will have their own cameras and crews for each venue. Those cameras will be set up in each team‘s stadium (Think they said they’ll have all sorts of angles, on the field too, 3D maybe. Idk, lots of bells and whistles). I don’t think they are doing that setup for us at YS, Citi, Hartford, etc…. We’ll probably get a mobile crew and equiptment to set up at the venue du jour. So NYCFC home games should suffer from a lesser audio and visual standard till we get our own SSS where the league can set up shop in. Unless they want to get all artsy do someting like handheld only for us, that might get really interesting.

Pro side to this. Our SSS will be the first built knowing the league will be controlling production. We’ll probably have a part of the stadium set up as a studio and have all the new microphones and camera angles in mind when designing it. So when it’s complete, ours will look the best on TV out of the whole league.