It’s USL! It’s NASL! It’s…um…wait a second… Or: The Long and Twisted Road to the US Second Division Season

Remember a couple of weeks ago when I was talking about MLS and the fight with the union, and about how it had all the gravitas and maturity of a fifth-grade playground kerfuffle?

Apparently dysfunction is a necessity in US soccer this year, because the road to the second division season has been even more fun.

Trust issues! A sale that wasn’t! Rogue leagues! Lawsuits! Purloined names! And plenty of, “No WE’RE the true sub-MLS division here and this town ain’t big enough for the both of us!” kind of stuff.

If you’re not familiar with the structure of US soccer, a quick review is in order.

MLS has been the top dog since its inception in 1996; it’s a single-entity system, owned and operated by the league itself. Beneath that and essentially completely separate, we’ve had the USL (United Soccer League). Under the USL umbrella are a few USL-1 teams, more USL-2s, and a whole bunch of PDL sides (the Professional Development League), plus women’s and age-level leagues.

There’s some cooperation between MLS and USL; MLS scouts for talent in USL teams, and sometimes lends them players. There are also conflicts, such as when USL owners abandon the USL ship for the excitement (and potential profit) of MLS (see: the entire Pacific Northwest), or worse, when rival ownership groups in a USL city make an MLS bid. But for the most part there’s not a lot of interaction. MLS is at the top, and they leave USL to do their own thing.

USL appears to have done their own thing at least somewhat well until maybe 2007 or so, when the previous USL majority owners, Umbro, were bought out by Nike. Nike soon became just as frustrated at running lower-level soccer in the US as the USL-1 owners became with them. (For an excellent recap of these frustrations, check out the links at the bottom from a series at Inside Minnesota Soccer, whose coverage of these issues has been stellar.) Among the big issues were a lack of attention to the concerns of the team owners, which caused some owners to organize into the TOA (Team Ownership Association) to push their concerns.

Eventually the TOA put on the pressure for serious change, and in 2009 Nike agreed to sell. The TOA hoped that this meant they’d sell to them. But…no.

The TOA teamed with Traffic Sports (owners of the Miami team) to participate in the sealed bid process. There were several other bids, including one from MLS — who were apparently at least somewhat interested in putting soccer in the US under one roof. (But not interested enough to be the high bidders.)

Okay, now pay attention here, because here’s where things get fun.

The owners and Traffic Sports did not submit the winning bid.

When the dust settled, and the winning bidder was announced internally, it was Jeff Cooper’s group [from St. Louis]. [...]

The TOA began working with Cooper, who had outbid their own efforts and found him to be on the same wavelength. With radical changes about to be made to the league under Cooper’s direction, a closing on the deal that appeared imminent was suddenly off.

Instead, Nike – who had formally recognized Cooper as the high bidder – shifted gears and awarded NuRock control of USL. This move, which was done legally but without properly notifying many owners, created a further rift with USL’s Tampa-based leadership.

NuRock, according to members of the TOA, was far less interested in cooperating with them, and several owners were not happy. Very vocally not happy, to the point that they didn’t pay their fees for 2010. And NuRock, the new owners, were not happy with the team owners who were not happy. (Or maybe they weren’t happy with the lack of fees paid in.) So in October NuRock dumped three teams — Carolina RailHawks, Minnesota Thunder and Miami FC Blues — out of USL, released these teams’ players from their contracts and removed all links to and mentions of the teams from their website.

Obviously this meant it was time for a breakaway league, and on November 10, that’s just what happened. The Atlanta Silverbacks, Carolina Railhawks, Miami FC, Minnesota Thunder, Montreal Impact and Vancouver Whitecaps joined forces with Jeff Cooper’s St. Louis team to announce their intent to form a new league.

Best part of all? The name: NASL — the North American Soccer League. (Ring a bell? It should.) Said Cooper:

“It was a name that I think we all had wanted to use, and we were thrilled when we found it was available.” By “available” Cooper meant that last company to hold the NASL trademark had let it lapse.

In a rather interesting coincidence, Alec Papadakis, one of two owners of NuRock — the owners from which the rogue teams were breaking — once played in the NASL. The original version. (O! Sweet irony!)

And of course this is America, so we have to have lawsuits. In December, NuRock sued the Tampa Bay Rowdies, Crystal Palace Baltimore, and the Rochester Rhinos for breach of contract after they reportedly committed to USL before changing their minds and switching to the breakaway NASL.

So at this point we’ve got not one but two Division 2 leagues in the US: The original USL-1, and the new NASL. (Breakdown of which teams went which way is here.) The problem for NASL was that it needed to be sanctioned by the US Soccer Federation, and USSF refused to step into that particular pile.

In a decision referred to at Goal.com as “a reverse Solomonic decision that’s akin to ordering Humpty Dumpty to put himself back together again,” USSF not only refused to sanction the new NASL, they also refused to sanction the old USL-1. Instead, on Dec. 30 they gave the two parties ten days to reach an amicable solution for 2010, saying that neither league could field the eight viable teams they felt were necessary for a league. (I’m not going to discuss why USSF made this decision, but for an interesting opinion check out Andrea Canales’ take at the Goal.com link above.)

So how does this all end?

For now, it ends in a way that will allow Division 2 soccer in the US to take place in 2010 while making none of the parties happy. As reported on our Montreal blog, there will be one Division 2 league. Which operates like two leagues. Except that they’ll play each other. And be run by the USSF, in case you were wondering. (Because the USSF surely won’t have anything else to do in a World Cup year.)

The league will consist of two six-team conferences – the USL Conference and the NASL Conference. The USL Conference will include teams from Austin, Minnesota, Portland, Puerto Rico, Rochester and Tampa Bay. The NASL Conference will consist of teams from Baltimore, Carolina, Miami, Montreal, St. Louis and Vancouver.

Or, in other words, something like this:

Yes, this is temporary — 2010 only. And no, this does not solve the problem of how a Division 2 that operates separately from MLS, and whose needs sometimes conflict with MLS, fits into the overall picture of soccer in the United States. Among the questions that will eventually need to be answered: Should USL teams be feeder leagues to MLS, or actual alternatives? Should USL follow the MLS business model or pursue their own? Who should be making these decisions? And what happens after 2010?

Right now, I don’t think anybody has a clue about the answers. But fans of smaller teams in smaller cities will now have teams to root for, at least in 2010. It may have taken a soap opera to get here, but I’m pretty sure that’s something to cheer about.

More in-depth (and truly excellent) reading on the topic can be found at Inside Minnesota Soccer.

Part 1: Building USL

Part 2: The Struggle for Power

Part 3: Negotiations Break Down

Nike Should Take Its Share of the Blame

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Category: World Football