Major League Soccer

Expansion plans have hit a few snags.

By Robert Wagman
SoccerTimes

(Wednesday, May 12, 2004) -- Almost two years ago Major League Soccer commissioner Don Garber announced his league planned to expand by two teams for the 2005 season, and then two more teams either in 2006 or 2007. Privately, MLS officials said Garber hoped to be able to announce the 2005 expansion cities by last summer's All-Star game.

But the All-Star game came and went without an announcement, which was then promised by November's MLS Cup final. A week or so before the match, Tim Leiweke, president and chief executive officer of Anschutz Entertainment Group, which owns and operates five of the 10 MLS teams, told a meeting of Los Angeles Galaxy season-ticket holders that MLS would expand by two teams in 2005 and that the two expansion teams would be Chivas USA, a spinoff of the Mexican power, and Cleveland.

Almost immediately, MLS chief operating officer Mark Abbott, who has had most of the day-to-day responsibility for expansion, sought to "clarify" Leiweke's comments. "It was characterized as being a done deal, and it isn't," Abbott told the Los Angeles Times.

Garber then used his presentation to the media before MLS Cup to "review" the status of potential expansion cities. He said that Chivas of Guadalajara owner Jorge Vergara had "finalized an agreement announced previously, signing a letter of intent to enter the league in 2005."

Garber confirmed that Vergara had agreed become an MLS investor and that the Chivas USA club, had agreed it would abide by all MLS rules, squelching talk that the league's limit on foreign players would be relaxed to allow the team to use more or all Mexican players. The proposed new franchise would not, despite rumors to the contrary, be ready to play by the 2004 season, even if a suitable venue was found. "Vergara remains in discussions with several interested markets for a 2005 expansion team," Garber said.

Garber also announced that Cleveland developer Bart Wolstein had "become our third new investor in the last four months, something we are obviously very excited about," and he agreed to build a soccer-specific stadium and to put a club in the northern Ohio city. "Cleveland is the leading contender since they have an owner who is committed to soccer," Garber said.

Ray Kroenke and his Kroenke Sports Enterprises had purchased the rights to own and operate the Colorado Rpaids from Anschutz in September.

Now, six month later, Chivas says it is ready to go, but has not yet found a city to play in. Wolstein's plan in Cleveland, at best, seems to be holding on by a thread. Today, there seem to be more questions than answers about MLS expansion.

MLS needs to expand to widen its footprint in the U.S. To be a truly national league, and especially for television purposes, it desperately needs to get into parts of the country, especially into large television markets, where it is not now. Since MLS contracted by terminating its two teams in Florida four years ago, it has had no team in the South, no team in the Pacific Northwest, and there exist big markets in other parts of the country without a team.

The league set up three criteria for a new franchise. First, there had to be what the league calls a "viable" ownership group, one willing to pay an expansion fee said currently to be $10 million. Secondly, the prospective new owner, or the state or city where the team is to be located, has to build a soccer-specific stadium in a reasonable time frame -- in the neighborhood of four years -- if one does not already exist. In the meantime, their needs to be an acceptable interim venue. Finally, there needs to be proof that the proposed market has a sufficient fan base and there needs to be the sale of 7,500 season tickets.

Abbott told the Oklahoman that the commitment of at least 7,500 advance season tickets is "not just to show that there is demand in the market, it's also to put the team on good footing as it starts. It's important to have a solid base when you begin."

For the past two years, Garber, Abbott and other MLS officials have been rushing from the coast-to-coast desperately trying to find interested potential ownership groups -- looking at cities, visiting stadiums, talking to mayors and governors -- and trying to put together expansion packages.

Going into the process, MLS developed a wish list led by its need to get into certain large television markets. Assuming there could be found potential ownership groups which met the three-pronged criteria, the initial expansion targets were Philadelphia and Houston. Then, given its geographical needs, MLS looked to expand to a city in the Pacific Northwest -- either Seattle or Portland, Ore. -- and possibly Atlanta or Birmingham, Ala., in the south, or another city in the Midwest or West.

After a considerable amount of effort, this wish list quickly dissolved. In Philadelphia, Jeffrey Lurie, who owns the National Football League's Eagles and the new Lincoln Financial Field, met with Garber and passed, at least for now. Lurie, under pressure from the city which had partially financed the stadium, then signed an agreement to host Temple University football games at Lincoln Financial which would make MLS scheduling difficult, if not impossible.

Garber also flew into Houston on the eve of a U.S.-Mexico match, a sellout at the new Reliant Stadium, and met at length with Robert C. McNair, owner of the NFL's Texans and the stadium. A week or so after the meeting, a spokesman for McNair said that the Texans organization was not able to move quickly enough to consider acquiring a new MLS franchise in 2005, but it might consider getting into soccer at a later date.

Although no public statement has ever been made, sources close to both Lurie and McNair told local reporters that both men had reservations about MLS's single-entity ownership, killing expansion in Philadelphia and Houston for the time being since no other potential ownership groups could be identified.

Vergara, with his desire to crack the vast U.S. market with its millions of Mexicans and Mexican-Americans, then emerged as the first choice in the expansion derby. Wolstein followed with his desire to have a new stadium with an MLS team anchor his dream development in Cleveland. Both situations, however, have been fraught with problems so far.

In the second part of this series, SoccerTimes looks at the current state of the Chivas USA bid and where Vergara's team might play. The third part will examine other potential expansion cities.

Robert Wagman is a SoccerTimes senior correspondent. E-mail Robert Wagman.