1. For MLS and domes, a retractable surface should be required
If you watched Monday’s college football national championship game from the University of Phoenix Stadium, you saw something potentially important for Major League Soccer’s future. You saw a retractable field in blessed action.
Yep. A beautifully plush natural grass surface, married with the climate-controlled comforts of an indoor (well, retractable roof) facility. How awesome does that sound as a solution to the turf wars and debates over temporary surfaces in soccer?
More to the MLS point, should this be a requirement going forward to any organization serious about joining the league and finding itself in a dome home? (Or, in any home stadium with artificial turf?)
Now you can get it all! They did inside the University of Phoenix Stadium for the biggest of college football biggies. The playing surface literally sits just outside the stadium, soaking up the sun; it gets rolled in a day or so before the game.
Clearly, any existing clubs would be grandfathered. But MLS now seems at a point where it can be choosey about incoming clubs and where they will play.
I was challenged on this point on Twitter, the contention thus: MLS is best in downtown grounds, and downtown real estate is too precious to waste, as the added field extends the project footprint significantly.
But I would argue not prohibitively so. Yes, it’s true that the University of Phoenix stadium is way out on the city’s outer edges. Closer to city centers a retractable field would add cost or complications on real estate – but not that much. We are basically talking about one small parking lot.
A perfect example happens to be in a city currently pushing hard to be part of MLS (although it wouldn’t play inside the city’s downtown dome). The Alamodome is smack downtown in San Antonio. If they wanted to fund the retractable field system, they could easily subtract (or more likely relocate) a part of one parking lot. Done.
Besides, we shouldn’t really talk about “downtown” stadiums as the perfect fit for MLS. The more precise wording here is “urban.” Most cities have good, local neighborhoods that are attached to light rail, areas dripping with potential to be wonderful stadium locations.
Don’t forget, Toronto was the club that critically ushered in our “MLS 2.0” era, all about that urban, 20- and 30-something fan and their urban ground, right? Well, BMO Field is not downtown. It’s close, and it’s certainly within the city, but it’s not downtown.
This conversation may not be critical in 2016, but it may be more important than you think. Remember, when it comes to MLS stadiums, 25K is the new 20K. In other words, it’s the new standard. See Item No. 1 here, and know that MLS commissioner Don Garber validated the sentiment in an ESPN Soccer Today interview last month. So it’s not a huge stretch to foresee a day when 25,000 might be seen as too small.
At that point, we could reach a very odd place, coming full circle to a place where big stadiums become de rigueur once again in MLS – albeit for very different reason than in the inaugural 1996 season.
Seattle Sounders FC and New England already share a facility with NFL. Atlanta United soon will, too (inside a dome, in fact). Vancouver plays inside a dome. The point is, as greater capacity becomes more necessary in MLS, this will be more of a discussion.
Here’s hoping that MLS makes a retractable, grass field element a requirement of any future stadium sharing agreements.
2. Is Joshua Yaro the next Andrew Wenger? (Hint: not a great thing)
Here’s hoping Joshua Yaro doesn’t become the next Andrew Wenger.
Yaro may be the No. 1 pick at this week’s MLS SuperDraft. The Georgetown defender has so much going for him: a great college resume, keen awareness in the back, smooth passing ability, good speed, etc.
What he doesn’t have is a position. Not exactly, anyway. A center back for the Hoyas, he’s mostly seen as a prospect at right back. Which delivers us once again to traditional place of American soccer conflict: sometimes a college team’s need comes at the detriment of an individual’s development. This, of course, is one of the cases against talented players pursuing pro soccer through the college ranks – but let’s not bog down here.
Yaro’s plight is not exactly the same as Wenger’s. Rather, it’s closer to the debate that we’ve long had over New England center back/ right back Andrew Farrell; He has played extensively as a right back and a center back in three seasons for the Revs.
But Wenger stands as one of the best example of what happens when versatility becomes a bane rather than a boon for top-talent types. Not that Wenger is having a terrible professional career; he’s doing OK – but just OK. He’s making a living in professional soccer and was a useful, if only part-time starter at Philadelphia over the last two years.
Still, it’s safe to say “useful” and “part-time starter” aren’t the descriptions we expected of Wenger when Montreal made him the No. 1 overall draft pick of 2012.
The problem, of course, is that nobody quite knew what to make of Wenger. The wonderful versatility that everyone talked about – the guy was a defender, a midfielder or a forward, depending on whom you asked – turned into a curse. Since he had never truly specialized, and since a truly once-and-for-all decision on his top positional potential has really never been reached, Wenger is already at his third MLS stop.
Suffice to say, he has not delivered on the serious upside everyone saw as he assumed the podium on that January day of 2012. The ability to perform in multiple positions sounds like a great thing. But if nobody can figure out where you fit best, you may drift in mediocrity, doing so in a variety of roles.
There is certainly a place for the proverbial utility knife, the “Jack of all trades,” on any MLS roster. A guy like Ryan Hollingshead will be invaluable to Oscar Pareja this year as FC Dallas takes on the additional burden of Champions League matches, for instance.
At an even higher level, look at Brad Evans’ value to Seattle; the guy can be a high functioning performer at five or six positions.
But those situations are unlike Yaro’s. Here is a guy of fabulous upside as a 21-year-old, a potential Best XI type if he’s allowed to develop as a center back. Who knows? He might get there as a right back.
The concern is that he isn’t big enough to play center back at top level, or that his listed height (5-11) might cap his level of performance at merely “good” rather than “great.” Then again, it’s not like all center backs must be 6-1 or taller. Yes, it helps – but Fabio Cannavaro was just 5-9, and he was considered a great center back in a land (Italy) known for producing defensive greats.
3. To Blatter and Platini: the game is bigger than you
As former FIFA officials Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini continue to battle to keep their places at the top of world soccer’s leadership, there is something that we probably do not talk about enough. There is overarching truth at work here, something they aren’t “getting.”
It’s not about them. This is all bigger than them, and they really need to figure that out.
This is the world’s game. Apologies to anybody in our country who loves American football or baseball or whatever, but it’s not even close. Soccer is the game of the globe and as such, it belongs to the people.
It does not “belong” to old men in suits, the Blatters and Platinis. If they had any honor, if they had a shred of humility and any regard for “greater good,” they would have long ago humbly stepped aside.
Somewhere in the world right now, a pro team is training. Probably a lot of them. Somewhere in the world right now, youth teams are learning the game from coaches who relish the job of teaching. Somewhere, kids are hard into pickup game. (“Next goal wins!”) Somewhere, someone is sad because the club they love and support has lost a big match, and nearby someone is full of pride because their club has prevailed.
That’s the world’s game. That’s what it should be about … not about a couple of guys who had some power and can’t stand the thought of losing it.
If they truly cared about the game, they’d walk away. They would understand that they are hurting the game – a game they purportedly love.
They should go. They should “get it.” The game isn’t about them. It doesn’t owe them anything.
4. Wednesday night MLS Cup final? Let’s talk about it …
If college football's crowing moment, the national championship game, can happen on a Monday night, then perhaps it really is time for MLS to try a Wednesday night final.
The idea has been kicked around a little, especially as TV ratings have been stagnant for the MLS Cup final. They’ve tried Saturday – but they bump up against college football. They’ve tried Sunday – but so much attention for Sunday sports gets swallowed up by NFL, of course.
That Saturday window would probably be better as conflicts go, but the league’s TV partners are heavily invested in college football, so that’s unlikely to happen. Which brings us back to the Wednesday notion.
No, it’s not the traditional destination for championship games in American professional sports. But it’s not completely unheard of, either. NBA and NHL titles have been decided on weeknights. Same for baseball’s World Series.
And it wasn’t so long ago that world soccer’s most celebrated club championship, the UEFA Champions League, was decided on Wednesday nights.
The notion deserves additional discussion, at very least.
5. The Little Five
5a. The Algarve Cup is a tremendous lesson in modern sports marketing. Tradition is important, of course, but it’s not a replacement for keeping up with the times. The Algarve Cup, a women’s national team event played annually in Portugal, could never muster a significant TV component nor attract dollars through major sponsorships. So the United States and other countries finally jumped ship; they’ll play in a newly christened SheBelieves Cup.
5b. No one should be too surprised that Jason Kreis has joined Jurgen Klinsmann’s national team camp as a temporary assistant. Klinsmann has long mentioned his respect for Kreis, who was among the MLS coaches whose training and physical conditioning methodologies mirrored the national team’s.
5c. Not all of the L.A. Galaxy’s recent decisions have made sense. Then again, some of them look like wily moves from a guy (Bruce Arena) who certainly knows what he’s doing; signing veteran defender Jeff Larentowicz is one of them. Arena has done this before, taking older MLS players who look increasingly like spare parts and turning them into important pieces that add depth and leadership. He did so with guys like James Riley, Jovan Kirovski, Chris Klein, Frankie Hejduk and Eddie Lewis, all of whom helped the Galaxy win titles.
5d. Speaking of L.A.: I really wonder if newly minted LAFC approached Landon Donovan about joining its starry cast of owners. Donovan probably wouldn’t do it; he was a longtime Galaxy figure, of course. Still, I wonder if the LAFC brain trust had the moxie to ask? What a shot across the bow that would be, eh, as these two prepare to compete for the city’s soccer heart?
5e. I cannot possibly understand this new wave of contrarian opposition to the physical testing at the MLS combine (even from writers that I seriously respect). Obviously, it should be only a component of the assessment process, not the crux of it. It falls under due diligence.