Executive Editor, Soccer America Magazine
What's to get excited about as MLS enters its second decade? It should depend on answers to these questions.
1.
Will Freddy be smiling and stylin'?
Freddy Adu's big smile turned to a frown last season. He complained about a lack of playing time (oh my!) and refused to apologize. So D.C. United coach Peter Nowak suspended him for its first playoff game against Chicago, which ousted the defending champs.
Offseason rumors had Adu fleeing, but of course he's still in the league that pays him $550,000 a year – 20 times what a couple of teammates make who took the field more often.
Adu, 16, played more games and produced more goals and assists in his first two seasons than teenage signing Eddie Johnson did in his first three seasons. Johnson broke out in his fourth year, leading the league in scoring.
So perhaps we're all being too impatient with Adu.
But his brief episodes of brilliance – like when he sombreroed a defender and glided past two others on a 50-yard run to score against Salt Lake – is what MLS needs in large doses.
If his third season is a charm, it's good news for Adu and great news for MLS.
2.
Is New York finally Bullish on MLS?
Eight coaches, including a World Cup winner, and several of the league's most hyped international stars failed to bring a single trophy into the MetroStars' case. Playing on the ground once graced by the glittering Cosmos, a decade of MetroStars dysfunction brought predictable disinterest from the fans and Soccer America columnist Paul Gardner long ago anagrammed the team's name into the RotMasters.
Now it's good-bye, MetroStars. Hello Red Bull New York.
The Austrian company that sells millions of cans of the sugary, caffeinated drink each year has turned an MLS team name into an advertisement.
Is Stan Kroenke, the last man to buy a team off Philip Anschutz, regretting he didn't turn the Rapids into Wal-Mart Colorado? Will we see the day when Red Bull meets Old Milwaukee at Pizza Hut Park?
For now, the main question is whether the MetroStars' malaise will be buried along with its moniker and MLS finally captures the imagination of the nation's biggest market.
3.
Will Pizza Hut deliver?
Michael Hitchcock's start in sports administration came early.
''In elementary school I was the commissioner of my neighborhood sports league,'' says Hitchcock. ''I charged kids their allowance and they got trophies competing in soccer, basketball, football and made-up sports, like croquet hockey on bikes.''
While in college Hitchcock decided soccer sales and marketing would be his call and he got his start at D.C. United, where his early days consisted of making 75 to 100 cold calls per day selling corporate ticket packages.
He also worked for Colorado and Los Angeles before landing the job of FC Dallas president last year as its new home, Pizza Hut Park, was completed.
Dallas averaged 16,000 in attendance in 1996 and saw that figured nearly halved over the years. But the team expects to make a profit this season, and Hitchcock plans to fill seats with a three-fold plan aimed at the youth, Hispanic and corporate markets.
''When I was at D.C. United,'' he says, ''corporate decision-makers thought soccer was communist football. Now we're finding that they have soccer background and that the clients they want to entertain and the employees they want to reward are soccer fans.''
Ambitious outreach to Hispanic fans is underway, and the club is finally bonding with the youth soccer community. Throw in a successful team, and Pizza Hut Park should fill up.
4.
Is Sigi just what the doctor ordered?
Of the nine MLS teams remaining from Year 1, only three have not reached MLS Cup – Red Bull (nTe MetroStars), Dallas and the Columbus Crew.
The Crew, self-proclaimed ''America's Hardest Working Team,'' has failed to toil its way into the playoffs in two of the last three seasons, including 2005, when its attendance, once among MLS's highest, dipped to 12,916 in what was MLS's first soccer-specific stadium.
In comes Coach Sigi Schmid, who guided the Los Angeles Galaxy to three MLS Cups, winning the title in 2002.
History isn't on the Crew's side, however. So far, the three coaches who moved on to another MLS squad after reaching MLS Cup – Lothar Osiander, Thomas Rongen and Bob Bradley – haven't repeated the feat.
5.
A proper home in Houston?
How could MLS abandon San Jose? Host of the league's inaugural game. The city where an exciting teenager named Landon Donovan turned the Earthquakes into the dominant team of the new millennium.
Even after the league let Donovan flee south in 2005, San Jose served up the league's best soccer and ruled the regular season as no other team ever had – going undefeated at home with smart, entertaining soccer.
So why?
Well, when San Jose won the 2001 title it couldn't even break the 10,000 mark in home attendance and it barely improved in the following two seasons, despite the World Cup publicity surrounding Donovan and another title run in 2003. Last year, it was eighth in attendance.
AEG moved the Earthquakes to Houston, because games with Mexican teams in America's fourth biggest city attract huge crowds.
Then they gave it a name, 1836, that offended Mexican-Americans. At best, it created plenty of MLS publicity during the four months the club had to market the team.
Now called the Dynamo, Coach Dominic Kinnear's team can popularize MLS for the right reasons if it plays the delightful ball it served up last season.
6.
Will the Goats have some heroes?
Based on points, Chivas USA was MLS's worst team in 2005, although it bettered Real Salt Lake head-to-head. Bottom line, both expansion teams struggled.
It should have been expected, considering the modest talent both teams fielded. Real Salt Lake's biggest star was the problematic Clint Mathis, while Chivas USA built around Mexican Second Division players. Compare that to MLS expansion in 1998, when both newcomers, Miami and Chicago, reached the playoffs. The league bought an impressive group of top-level foreigners for title winner Chicago and even Miami's roster was substantially more impressive than Salt Lake's or Chivas USA's.
A better Salt Lake is certainly what the supportive city deserves, but Chivas USA's future is even more crucial for the league whose ability to attract Hispanic soccer fans depends on it. Those doubting the importance of Hispanic fans to a U.S. soccer venture need only be reminded that Spanish-language Univision paid $325 million for World Cup rights, and English rights went for $100 million.
Moreover, MLS clubs reported that Chivas USA fans proved the most enthusiastic away supporters. Imagine the atmosphere if Coach Bob Bradley manages to turn the Goats into contenders.
7.
Tapping a fountain of youth?
MLS Commissioner Don Garber puts it, ''We've been doing a lot of work on stadiums – a lot of work with bricks and mortar – now we need to do more with flesh and blood, with the game itself.''
The next step is getting serious about priming youth players for the pros and expanding on Project-40/adidas Generation programs that targeted a small number of the elite.
''We are developing top-class players in the country and ultimately that has to be the biggest part of our solution,'' says Deputy Commissioner Ivan Gazidis, ''and we're working hard on better and deeper player development programs so that can be accelerated even further.''
Coming soon, says the league, are ambitious team-run player development programs and a system by which youth players in whom clubs invest can move onto the team's roster instead of going into the draft.
8.
Where will MLS find a 14th team?
The league's next expansion comes in 2007 from Canada. Toronto and its new stadium will join MLS, which follows the course taken by the NASL, which spread to Montreal, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton and Toronto.
The league plans to add a 14th team in 2008 and cities under consideration are Milwaukee, Philadelphia, St. Louis, San Diego and even San Jose, if it conjures up a new stadium, the lack of which helped doom the Quakes.
But amid prospects of growth lurks the fact that existing teams seek need new owners. AEG wishes to sell D.C. United (where a deal collapsed) and Houston, while Lamar Hunt, who also owns Columbus and Dallas, has been trying to unload Kansas City for a year.
9.
Will Barn Burners rock Bridgeview?
That the legions of America's soccer players haven't been converted into fans has long been lamented. Flynn Murphy, 22, is different. He played youth ball, didn't like it, then became one of Chicago's super fans.
''I was a shy kid and didn't like playing in front of screaming adults,'' says the ''communication director'' of Section 8 Chicago, the umbrella group that unifies the Chicago Fire's various fan groups, e.g., Barn Burners 1871, Fire Ultras 98, Mike Ditka Street Crew, Ultras Red-Side.
While in his mid-teens, Murphy saw some games on TV and enjoyed them. Next he became a regular at Chicago games, joining the fanatics in Section 8 of Soldier Field who created one the league's most electric atmospheres.
On June 25, the Fire moves into a new 21,000-seat stadium in Bridgeview. Section 8ers such as Flynn, the youth soccer community and immigrant fans have provided strong support for the Fire.
The move to Bridgeview, located southwest of Chicago, takes the Fire farther away from the north Chicago youth hotbed, but closer to Hispanic enclaves – and the fan club contingent is likely grow.
''We made noise at Soldier Field,'' says Flynn, a Mike Ditka Street Crew man, ''but that place was a cavern. We'll be right on top of the field in Bridgeview, and it's really gonna rock.''
10.
Who's new and likely to thrill?
In the English Premier League, a middle-of-the-standings team in need may spend $10 million on a transfer fee for a foreign striker and $1 million on his salary. MLS investors don't come close to spending that kind of money to spice up their league.
The salary cap for an MLS team is less than $2 million – for its entire roster – and the league rarely signs foreign stars.
For 2006, Chivas USA welcomes Mexican Claudio Suarez, who shares the world record for most national team appearances at 173, but he is 37 years old. Columbus newcomer Sebastian Rozental is only 29 and has played 35 times for Chile, but he has skipped around to four different leagues in a career plagued by injuries.
MLS, more than ever, is depending on domestic products, and most of the new faces in 2006 will be untested Americans.
''The United States is developing far more star players than it ever has,'' says Deputy Commissioner Ivan Gazidis.
11.
A World Cup bounce or thud?
This summer's World Cup in Germany is certain to attract more attention in the USA than any World Cup since the USA hosted the 1994 tournament that led to MLS's launch.
U.S. TV viewership for the 2002 World Cup, despite middle-of-the-night air times, increased from France '98 and set records on Univision and ESPN. Already, pre-World Cup media coverage has been impressive. So what will it mean for MLS, which plays through the tournament, if the country goes World Cup crazy?
Will MLS games prove disappointing for those fresh off watching the world's best players, or will fans in need of a post-World Cup soccer fix flock to MLS games?
In the best-case scenario, a good U.S. performance will popularize its MLS players. No matter what, a spotlight on soccer for a full month will take the sport further into mainstream America's consciousness, which can only be good for the nation's league.
(This article originally appeared in the April 2006 issue of Soccer America Magazine.)