What Would You Do as MLS Commmissioner?

By: Laurie | November 30th, 2007

There’s interesting debate going on over at Soccer by Ives today. Ives asks, if you were MLS Commissioner for a day,

“what one change would you make to the league if you had that magical power to change things?”

My personal favorite so far? “Demote Alexi Lalas to serving hot dogs at HDC.”

I probably wouldn’t waste my one wish on Alexi, but it did make me giggle. Although I’d probably happily settle for surgically sewing his mouth shut. (Anesthesia at Galaxy fans’ option.) I think that would solve most problems.

The post made me think, though.

MLS management and ownership takes a lot of criticism, and a lot of it is justified. But they’ve also done many things right that they don’t get credit for. The salary cap was brilliance in the early years. Ditto slow expansion. These things kept the league from collapsing under the weight of high hopes that weren’t matched by US reality.

Thing is, though, reality is slowly but surely catching up to those hopes. Yet MLS remains mired in much of its old thinking. And the fans are in the dark as to how much those previous fears are still justified, because MLS management operates in near total secrecy. Especially where money is concerned. (Remember that owners who spoke about their recent meeting faced fines.)

So here is the one change I would make:

If I were MLS Commissioner for a day, I would require that all financial documents and all management decisions be made public.

I’m evil, aren’t I?

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Comments  

• Agi |  November 30th, 2007 at 1:17 pm

  
  
  

  Make it a single table, without playoffs, where points matter. Like a real league.

  Posted from United States

  

• combat chuck |  November 30th, 2007 at 1:22 pm

  
  
  

  @Agi: Amen to that. And find some DP’s that are less than 30 years old.

  Posted from United States

  

• Ian |  November 30th, 2007 at 1:34 pm

  
  
  

  Stop making up tournaments as an excuse to have Beckham play three games a week. Next up, the LA Galaxy take on the champions of Moldova and Thailand in the Super World Champion Cup!

  Posted from United States

  

• BCross52 |  November 30th, 2007 at 1:46 pm

  
  
  

  Get out of refereeing. Let the referees blow the whistle and card players for ugly, dangerous tackles before some hacker ends the career of a player with actual talent.

  Posted from United States

  

• Dick |  November 30th, 2007 at 8:56 pm

  
  
  

  I’m with BCross52. The game is beautiful when those with talent are allowed to make it so. There is no other league I watch that tolerates the cynical and dangerous fouls that are commonplace in MLS. Even from a marketing viewpoint, MLS is trying to sell a product that is not remotely as exciting and attractive as it would be if the talentless hackers were sent packing.

  Posted from United States

  

• Tony |  December 2nd, 2007 at 1:02 pm

  
  
  

  I wanted a single table for a long time as well but have come to the realization that it won’t work for the MLS. A single table format does 3 things: crowns a champion, demotes teams to a lower league and those at the top of the table get to also participate in an extra continental tournament (Champions League, Copa Libertadores, etc) Besides crowning a champion a table is worthless in our case.

  The current playoff system is good, just missing a few things. Keep the home and away game 1st rounds but add the away goals rule. God forbid they play to win and not draws.

  Expand the Super Liga. It was a success but it should be a tourney with the big four associations: Mexico, Argentina, USA and Brazil. Get the gig names involved 1st then make it to a champions league. With this in place single table starts making sense.

  Host the MLS Cup in prospective cities. That would be a good way to test the waters of expansion. It also promotes the league in cities that don’t have teams. I live in Phoenix and would love a team here. With that said, I can and am an MLS fan. No matter what your business is you can’t promote it enough

  Posted from United States

  

• PocketKings |  December 4th, 2007 at 10:41 am

  
  
  

  I’m with Tony on a few things… But in a slightly different way -

  1. We need to ask to join the long standing Copa Libertadores and make it into our Champions League. We are the youngest league on the block (Mex, Bra, Arg) and we shouldn’t go around telling them what to do! We should get our TOP 2 Regular season teams into this tournament (The same with FMF - top 2 teams however they want to figure it out). If we get more berths, then we can add the MLS Cup winner as well.
  2. Increase Superliga to include Central American teams. We send our 3rd-6th teams, Mexico sends their 3rd-6th teams, and take the top 2 from Guatamala, Honduras, etc.
  3. Send 7th & 8th to play in the newly created Pan Pacific tournament. (Shit, we could A and J leagues to participate in Superliga if they want)
  4. Shift the MLS cup to the start of the season. Play the entire thing home-away, including away goals, including the finals.
  5. Buy UDL-1 and UDL-2, take the top 4 UDL-1 teams into MLS, and push all the UDL-2 teams into a single UDL-1 league… then we can have promotion/relegation.

  This is all designed to make regular season play more important and BETTER!!!!

  Posted from United States

  

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