WITH ONLY A LITTLE TREPIDATION, I'm looking forward to the entry of CD Guadalajara owner Jorge Vergara into MLS.
Assuming his finances are in order, his bravado will shake up the MLS board rooms and bring more fire to the games played in league stadiums.
He's a fresh face and a long-needed new investor for MLS, which for the past two seasons has labored with just three ownership groups.
Vergara has already proclaimed his desire to win the MLS title. As competitive as the action on the field has been, proclamations and predictions seldom emanate from the offices of the Anschutz Entertainment Group, Hunt Sports Group or Kraft Soccer Properties.
How much swagger can you expect from corporations, anyway? Their forte is financial feasibility, not robust ripostes.
True, Vergara oversees a grand business empire that began with vitamin outfit Omnilife, but his MLS team will be his only league interest. The same will be true when the Colorado Rapids are sold to Denver mogul Stan Kroenke, who owns several other pro teams but not more than one in any one league.
Kroenke paid $450 million to buy the NBA Nuggets, NHL Avalanche, and Pepsi Center a few years ago. He didn't make the dough clipping coupons.
The entry of Vergara and Kroenke will also buttress the league's stance that its single-entity system can be an attraction, not a deterrent, to certain entrepreneurial types, be they American or otherwise.
This doesn't mean single-entity will stand forever. It's not everyone's cup of tea. But it has steered the league through some desperately hard times, and whatever MLS has lacked in glamour, it has made up for by simply sticking around.
Will there be a backlash from those American players who regard Mexico as a bitter rival? Maybe. But at least a few native-born lads will be playing for Vergara. They just might get buzzed on a visible, assertive owner who shoots for the moon and plays to win.
by Soccer America Senior Editor Ridge Mahoney