Author: Beau Dure

The guy who wrote a bunch of soccer books and now runs a Gen X-themed podcast while substitute teaching and continuing to write freelance stuff.
college sports

Duke apparently not destroyed by lacrosse backlash

Posted on by Beau Dure

To recap the Duke lacrosse case in brief: Team members accused of rape, media firestorm ensues at Duke, evidence emerges that they couldn’t possibly have done it, students exonerated, district attorney disbarred.

Most people then moved on. The exceptions were the families of the team members who were not accused of rape, claiming the school and others didn’t do enough to protect them. That case, we learned in March, has lost steam.

The other people who did not move on: The cottage industry of people with an ax to grind against Duke, political correctness, “liberals,” academic elites or others who have supposedly wronged them in some way. They insisted Duke’s response to the case represented PC anti-masculine anti-athlete bias, and it would kill Duke’s ability to attract students, let alone student-athletes.

Here’s a quick look at application data (up from 19,358 to 31,785 in last eight years).

And here’s a look at how student-athletes are faring:

So in short: I think those folks were wrong.

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college sports

War on nonrevenue sports, ctd: How college sports programs die

Posted on by Beau Dure

My old paper in Wilmington has a thorough report on UNC-Wilmington’s decision to cut a few sports.

Title IX influenced the decision-making on what to cut, but the figures show some women’s programs bringing in more money than their male counterpart. (In most cases, though, the expenses are higher.)

The numbers also show men’s basketball, the non-football school’s showcase sport, as the biggest revenue-generator by far. But it had expenses of $1.87 million against revenue of $557,624.

So if you were going strictly on finances, you’d cut the basketball team and leave the others.

They’re not going to do that, of course. Cutting the basketball team would be a huge blow to UNCW.

But then does that mean college sports serve an intangible purpose of school spirit rather than the tangible purpose of giving student-athletes a chance to compete?

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soccer

U.S. Open Cup second round, collated scoreboard

Posted on by Beau Dure

Headlines (see glossary below):

– The NPSL is out. Georgia Revolution fell 3-2 in the “Battle of Atlanta” against the NASL Silverbacks.

– The USASA is out, though Dearborn took Dayton (USL Pro) to extra time before falling 4-1.

– PDL upsets so far: Reading over Harrisburg (USL Pro), Ocean City over Pittsburgh (USL Pro), Des Moines over Minnesota (NASL), Tucson over San Antonio (NASL)

– Tampa Bay Rowdies (NASL) won the first head-to-head matchup between pro teams, winning the Tampa Bay derby 2-1 and forcing perennial Open Cup power Seattle Sounders to fly cross-country to face them next week. Other MLS teams with long trips: Los Angeles, San Jose, Colorado, Dallas. The NASL’s Atlanta and USL Pro’s Wilmington have long trips the other direction.

– Local derbies in the third round: Richmond-D.C., Columbus-Dayton, Philadelphia-Ocean City, L.A. Blues-Chivas USA

Final scores (home teams listed first):

USL PRO vs. AMATEUR (8 PDL, 2 USASA)

Richmond (USLP) 4-1 Icon FC (USASA), final
Richmond – D.C. United (again)

Dayton (USLP) 4-1 Dearborn (USASA), final (extra time)
Columbus – Dayton

Reading (PDL) 1-0 Harrisburg City (USLP), final (apologies for having it wrong earlier)
New York (Red Bulls, not FC) – Reading

Ocala (PDL) 1-2 Orlando City (USLP), final
Orlando – Colorado

Charlotte (USLP) 3-0 Seattle Sounders U23 (PDL), final
Charlotte – Chicago

Ocean City (PDL) 1-0 Pittsburgh (USLP), final
Philadelphia – Ocean City

Rochester (USLP) 1-0 GPS Portland Phoenix (PDL), final
Rochester – New England

Austin (PDL) 0-2 Wilmington (USLP), final
Portland – Wilmington

Los Angeles Blues (USLP) 5-1 Ventura County (PDL), final
Los Angeles Blues – Chivas USA

Portland Timbers U23 (PDL) 0-1 Charleston (USLP), final
Charleston – San Jose

NASL vs. AMATEUR (4 PDL, 1 NPSL)

Georgia Revolution (NPSL) 2-3 Atlanta (NASL), final
Salt Lake – Atlanta

Carolina Railhawks (NASL) 3-1 Carolina Dynamo (PDL), final
Carolina Railhawks – Los Angeles

Fort Lauderdale (NASL) 1-1 Laredo (PDL), Fort Lauderdale wins 7-6 on PKs
Fort Lauderdale – Dallas

Minnesota (NASL) 0-1 Des Moines (PDL), final
Kansas City – Des Moines

San Antonio (NASL) 2-2 Tucson (PDL), Tucson wins 4-3 on PKs
Houston – Tucson

USL PRO vs. NASL

VSI Tampa Bay FC (USLP) 1-2 Tampa Bay (NASL), final
Tampa Bay Rowdies – Seattle

Glossary:

The divisional structure in the USA/Canada is:

Division 2: NASL, North American Soccer League. (Not the one that featured Pele and so forth in the 70s.)

Division 3: USL Pro, the top flight of the United Soccer Leagues

PDL: Premier Development League, the USL’s summer amateur league. Mostly college players.

NPSL: National Premier Soccer League, an independent amateur league, also operating mostly in summer.

USASA: U.S. Adult Soccer Association, a national body administering most local and regional leagues.

0
mma

Leaving the UFC: It’s the money

Posted on by Beau Dure

John Cholish is leaving MMA, saying he lost money on his last fight.

It’s not really a function of the recently exposed fighter contract, which only accounts for a small part of the problem — Cholish had to pay out of pocket for some of his corner crew. It’s very simple: He’s not making money.

As Brent Brookhouse puts it at Bloody Elbow:

This is why some people get very hung up on the revenue distribution inequality between the UFC and the fighters. That’s not to say that the UFC should be paying out the close to 50% of revenue to fighters that we see from the NFL and NBA, but it doesn’t seem like a stretch to think that fighters that make it to the biggest stage in the sport be able to fight full time and take home an amount of money that their elite skills would seem to demand.

The Major League Soccer historian in me warns that any labor action should be taken with a degree of caution. When MLS players sued the league, the league nearly collapsed.

Then we have two other factors to consider:

1. Other organizations that have come into the MMA marketplace with big-money offers have quickly died. We can’t forget that the UFC bled money for many years before turning the corner less than 10 years ago, and now we’re seeing some troubling indicators on ratings and other measures of interest in the sport.

2. The UFC’s owners have a few negative associations with unions, with good reason.

 

 

0
olympic sports, track and field

Woly Award: Jordan Burroughs rules the mat

Posted on by Beau Dure

Wrestler Jordan Burroughs is the winner of this week’s Woly, the weekly award for U.S. Olympic-sports athletes.

I used to give this award for USA TODAY, and it continued for a while after I departed. They stopped, so I’m restarting.

Burroughs, the Olympic and world champion, capped a big weekend for his sport with two massive wins, running his international record to an astounding 54-0. He needed to rally to win his match against Russia’s Saba Khubetzhty at Wednesday’s “Rumble on the Rails,” but under new international scoring rules, he roared past the same opponent Sunday in Los Angeles.

The USA lost to Iran in the first head-to-head matchup Wednesday at Grand Central Terminal, rebounded to swamp Russia, adapted after Iran withdrew from the L.A. event, then won seven matches in L.A.

A couple of other events from Olympic sports last week:

TRACK AND FIELD: “WL” = “world list,” the top performances in the world this year.

At the Diamond League meet in Shanghai, the USA’s Jason Richardson and Ryan Wilson finished 1-2 in the men’s 110 hurdles and moved into first and third on the world list at 13.23 and 13.25.

 

Other results:

Men’s 400: Kirani James (JAM, 44.02) and LaShawn Merritt (USA, 44.60) top two WL.

Women’s 100: Shelly Ann Fraser-Pryce (JAM) 10.93, top WL.

Women’s 400 hurdles: Top two WL: Zuzana Hejnova (CZE, 53.79) and Angela Morosanu (ROU, 53.85).

Men’s long jump: Top two WL: Li Jinzhe (CHN, 8.34) and Aleksandr Menkov (RUS, 8.31)

Men’s javelin: Top two WL: Tero Pitkamaki (FIN, 87.60) and Vitezslav Vesely (CZE, 86.67)

Men’s 3,000 steeplechase: Top seven times WL, all Kenyans. Winner: Conseslus Kipruto, age 18, 8:01.16.

Women’s 5,000: Top eight times WL, all Kenya and Ethiopia. Winner: Genzebe Dibaba (ETH, 14:45.92)

In Los Angeles, three U.S. runners moved into third, fourth and fifth on the world list: Jennifer Simpson (2:00.45), Phoebe Wright (2:00.58), LaTavia Thomas (2:00.68). No. 1 is 2:00.33. Also, Mary Cain demolished the U.S. junior record in the 1,500 (4:04.62).

In Ponce, Puerto Rico, U.S. hurdler Johnny Dutch ran a world-leading 48.02 to upset the host country’s Javier Culson (48.36, 2nd WL).

CYCLING: Tejay van Garderen proved he can win a multistage race and that a cyclist can win a multistage race with a newborn at home. He’s the new Tour of California champion.

The rest of the week in Olympic sports: the U.S. men won bronze in ice hockey’s World Championships, U.S. women won eight gold medals in Continental Championship boxing, and Olympians Brady Ellison and Khatuna Lorig won mixed-team gold in the archery World Cup opener.

0
soccer

Washington Spirit vs. Portland: The forward dilemma

Posted on by Beau Dure

I won’t belabor the Thorns’ 2-0 win over Washington, having spent most of the game discussing it on Twitter with everyone who’s likely to read this post. But I should address the big question on everyone’s minds: Wouldn’t the Spirit be much better if they had some cloned hybrid of Alex Morgan, Christine Sinclair, Abby Wambach, Mia Hamm and early-90s Michelle Akers at forward?

Well, yeah. But let’s talk realistically here.

The Spirit had a pretty good road trip. That first win at Seattle was a good confidence boost for a young team. They showed that confidence today, going toe-to-toe with the best team in the NWSL. And they defended well, moved the ball well …

… and had a really hard time generating chances.

And so Twitter was once again agog at the obvious disparity in forward allocations between Washington and Portland. The Thorns got one goal each from the dynamic duo of Christine Sinclair and Alex Morgan. Sinclair’s goal, a beautiful curling shot that left Chantel Jones no chance, left the Spirit chasing the game. While the Spirit pushed everyone forward, bringing in the usual late-game subs of Caroline Miller and Jasmyne Spencer, Morgan scored on the counter.

But here’s what people forget — the Thorns are good all the way up and down the roster. If you suddenly transposed Miller and Sinclair with the Spirit’s front-runners, would Washington win this game? Probably not.

Maybe Tiffany McCarty wasn’t as sharp as she was on Thursday, and maybe it wasn’t Stephanie Ochs’ best game. But the Thorns really don’t give up a lot of chances. They’ve only conceded four goals in seven games.

By the time Miller and Spencer came on, Portland was clinging to its lead. Miller had an instant impact as always, and Ochs forced Karina LeBlanc to make a tough save late, but the Thorns weren’t going to break easily.

So for the Spirit, this was another moral victory of sorts — more proof that they’re not the pushovers people thought they would be. At least after the road trip, they have an actual victory in addition to the moral victories.

What next? Should the Spirit do something to shore up the attack?

A couple of issues with that:

1. In many games so far, the Spirit hasn’t had enough possession to worry about the forwards. Against Portland, they had the ball for a while but didn’t find a way through. The problem wasn’t that the final touch or the final pass was lacking — it was the pass before that.

2. Who’s available? The Spirit has a free-agent spot remaining but has pretty much promised it to a defender we’re currently calling Unnamed Euro. Unless that deal unravels, the Spirit would likely have to make a trade to get a quality forward.

3. Do you disrupt the chemistry on a developing young team by trading? Or do you keep working to develop Miller, McCarty and Ochs, who’ve done the job at every other level and have shown glimpses of their potential here? (Related question: Even if Tasha Kai suddenly picks up the phone and says she wants to come to Washington, do you bring her in?)

My guess is that the Spirit would be better off waiting it out until the forwards pick up that extra bit of mental speed they’ll need to compete.

One idea that probably won’t fly: As much as another NWSL team might want goalkeeper Chantel Jones after her strong performance today, the Spirit would surely demand a lot in return, especially with Ashlyn Harris banged up and due for a national team call-up later in the season. A solid backup goalkeeper is not a disposable asset in this league.

Soccer is a sport that tests everyone’s patience, but I think that’s what Spirit fans will need. Eventually, we should see Miller or Ochs find the net. And as I’ve said a few times, you still haven’t seen Colleen Williams, who was injured in preseason.

Until then — fun team to watch, isn’t it? Glad to be writing a book about them.

8
soccer

W-League, WPSL still going – with a few changes

Posted on by Beau Dure

The old leagues are not dead. Long live the new league — and the old ones.

The USL’s W-League has survived to its 19th season. Heading to last season, the league lost no teams and added three. Of those three teams, two have rebranded (Central SC Cobras –> Carolina Elite Cobras; VSI Tampa Flames –> VSI Tampa Bay FC).

This season, several teams have gone:

– FC JAX Destroyers, the third new team from last season, fared poorly in their debut and shut down along with their men’s team of two seasons. Little official word except for a comment on Facebook (see response to Ian Garrett):

– The New Jersey Rangers club was folded into Luso Soccer Academy, sans the overmatched W-League team, which won four games in its 2010 debut and only once since then.

– The Northern Virginia Majestics have wrapped up a 14-year run (at least for now) by throwing their efforts into the Washington Spirit’s operations. The club will still have youth operations reaching up through the Super-Y League.

– The Rochester Ravens, another long-standing team, also decided not to compete with the Western New York Flash now firmly established in the market.

– The most surprising news came from Canada, where the Vancouver Whitecaps had demonstrated that they weren’t interested in going to a top-flight league despite a long line of Canadian national team players on the all-time roster. But did anyone expect that they would drop from the W-League to the PCSL?

– The Victoria Highlanders, a longtime PCSL team that spent a couple of years in the W-League, also dropped back to the PCSL and will play under the unwieldy name Peninsula Co-Op Highlanders.

Then there’s one change: D.C. United Women are now the Washington Spirit. With the top squad in the NWSL, the W-League team will be the reserves.

The Spirit reserves are amateur, but the W-League has at least one pro team this season: The Bay Area Breeze have moved over from the WPSL.

Three teams renamed – Hamilton (now K-W United FC) and the aforementioned Carolina and Tampa Bay changes. Also, New York Magic added “-FA Euro” to the name

So the league has gone through yet another pro league’s launch with a few changes but not a complete overhaul. As the song says, steady as she goes.

The WPSL is larger and looser by design. Last year, the league put together an Elite league, providing a helpful bridge from WPS to the NWSL. WPS clubs Western New York, Boston and Chicago were able to stay on the field while giving a lot of players a chance to stay in the game, and the Long Island Fury’s New York offshoot put together another strong pro team under Paul Riley’s guidance.

Now Western New York, Boston and Chicago are back in the fully pro ranks with the NWSL. The New York Fury are gone, though the Long Island Fury remain in the WPSL. The New England Mutiny return home to regular WPSL play. So will the Philadelphia Fever and ASA Chesapeake Charge, two teams that played in the Elite last season. We’ll come back to the eighth team, FC Indiana.

Change is constant in the WPSL. Check David Litterer’s archive, and you’ll see 15-20 teams moving in and out of the league each of the past few years.

(For the current version of the NWSL, W-League and WPSL, check out this map from Laura Taylor:

[cetsEmbedGmap src=https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msid=206089036518127071689.0004c5e64b34c2bac8df5&msa=0&ll=39.842286,-94.482422&spn=36.415967,86.572266 width=500 height=375 marginwidth=0 marginheight=0 frameborder=0 scrolling=no]

And the situation tends to be fluid. The Houston Aces site still makes several references to playing in the Elite League this season, though there’s no sign that the Elites are back in 2013.

The Houston site lists three of its games with a WPSL Elite logo — two vs. FC Indiana, one vs. San Diego. But the San Diego site lists the Houston game as “Inter League Exhibition.”

Then consider FC Indiana, which fielded a lot of Haitian national team players and picked up five points in 14 WPSL Elite games last year? We know they’ll field a team in WLS (Women’s League Soccer), which is moving indoors.

As for the summer — they’re playing the WPSL’s Houston Aces twice in May. The Houston Aces site lists the opponent as “FC Indiana (Haiti WNT).”

On FC Indiana’s Facebook page, they say they’re chasing another league title, and they say they’re playing WPSL. But their games aren’t listed on the WPSL site, and they’re not mentioned in the standings.

And remember the L.A. Vikings, which put together big exhibitions with impressive rosters? Web pages are gone, Twitter hasn’t updated since November, Facebook has gone even longer.

The WPSL site does have a few words on their new teams and the Eastern Conference.

The Pacific South and South Atlantic look strong. The Pac South has three perennial powers, one of whom (San Diego) just added a top-level WPS player (Nikki Krzysik). The South Atlantic has two former WPSL Elite teams (ASA Chesapeake Charge, Philadelphia Fever) and the ambitious ACF Torino USA (formerly Maryland Capitols FC).

As best as I can tell, here’s the list of who’s in and who’s out:

IN
ASA Chesapeake Charge (from WPSL Elite)
Philadelphia Fever (from WPSL Elite)
New England Mutiny (from WPSL Elite)
Boston Breakers College Academy
Des Moines Menace (from WLS)
AC Seattle (mostly Italian)
Tualatin Hills United Soccer Club Diamonds
Westside Timbers
A second California Storm team (now Storm Elk Grove and Storm Sacramento)
Los Angeles Premier FC
Tucson Soccer Academy
Fire and Ice Soccer Club
Kansas City Shock
Empire Revs WNY
FC Westchester
Tri-City Celtic
Yankee Lady FC
FC Lehigh Valley United Lady Sonic
New Jersey Blaze (returning from hiatus)
Lions Swarm (Southern Maryland)
FC Surge (South Florida)
Alabama FC (Birmingham)

OUT
Bay Area Breeze (now pro team in W-League)
Los Angeles Vikings (see above)
Portland Rain (Portland Timbers now backing NWSL’s Portland Thorns)
FC Dallas (MLS team out)
New England Mutiny Reserves (parent team is in)
Phoenix U23 (parent team remains)
Mississippi Fuego FC U23 (parent team remains)
Tampa Bay Hellenic
American Eagles
FC Austin
Arkansas Comets
West Texas Pride FC
FC Milwaukee Nationals
Ohio Premier Women’s SC
FCW Elite
Milburn Magic
Clermont Phoenix

OUT?
FC Indiana

NAME CHANGES/REPLACEMENTS
Salt Lake United –> Real Salt Lake Women (MLS affiliate)
FC St. George –> St. George United
Aztec MA –> Boston Aztec
Maryland Capitols FC –> ACF Torino USA
Penn Legacy Inferno –> Lancaster Inferno

DIVISION CHANGE
Long Island Fury (New England –> Tri-State)
New York Athletic Club (Mid Atlantic –> Tri-State)
FC Bucks (South Atlantic –> Tri-State)
Buxmont Torch (South Atlantic –> Tri-State)

All told: Last season, the WPSL had 73 teams, including eight in the Elite League. This year, it’s 70.

Corrections, updates, explanations welcome.

2
soccer

Washington Spirit at Seattle: Battle of the unluckys

Posted on by Beau Dure

I’ll have to confess that I didn’t stay up to watch the Spirit’s late-night game at Seattle last night. I won’t belabor my scheduling problems, but it simply made more sense for me to get up and watch it on demand this morning, thanks to the NWSL’s nice YouTube archive:

And this might be the way I approach games I don’t see myself. I’m not there to gather quotes, and I haven’t seen much reaction to the game except this from Seattle coach Laura Harvey (via SoccerWire’s Liviu Bird):

“We concede stupid goals. We just let teams back into games, and we keep doing it.”

And that sums it up. The Spirit won 4-2, and it wasn’t even Washington’s best performance of the season.

Seattle struck early in each half, and each time, a Washington defender was nowhere in sight. The Reign’s Lindsay Taylor neatly chest-trapped the ball in front of Ingrid Wells and hammered the ball past a stunned Ashlyn Harris in the seventh minute to give Seattle a 1-0 lead. In the second half, with Washington leading 2-1, Seattle’s Christine Nairn played a ball into the air for Teresa Noyola, who was marked only by the 5-foot-0-and-change Diana Matheson.

Credit Taylor and Noyola for terrific finishes, but the Spirit may need to figure out what happened defensively on those plays and a couple more, including one in which Noyola and another Reign player had half the box to themselves. Seattle had too easy of a time getting the ball into empty space.

Seattle, though, has more difficult defensive questions to answer. Losing Katie Deines early in the game didn’t help, but the goal that put Washington in the lead was embarrassing — Michelle Betos made the first save off Lori Lindsey’s free kick, only to see Ali Krieger pop up in front of her for the rebound. Betos made another save, but Krieger still had time to leap and nod the ball into the net. The Reign players in the box simply failed to react.

The best part for the Spirit: The chances were converted. Robyn Gayle found Matheson deep in the Reign’s half of the field, and the Canadian dynamo lashed it past Betos at a tough angle. Tiffany McCarty, who made a good case for remaining in the starting lineup, beat three defenders with one touch and clinically finished. And Tori Huster showed why she’s been getting such (Ow! Ooof!) attention on set pieces, finishing with a glancing header when the Reign defense lost her on a free kick.

The bottom line: Washington is a young team, as we’ve said over and over again. Getting that first win is just the boost of confidence they needed. This was a battle between two teams that have been dealt a good bit of misfortune — take all the players each team had from allocations and the drafts, and you’d make two drastically different starting lineups. (A Garciamendez-Noyola matchup would have been fun!)

Now on to Portland, where it’s virtually impossible to imagine a visiting team wi … wait … what?

0
soccer

NWSL attendance: Perception, reality and more perception

Posted on by Beau Dure

We’re roughly 20% of the way through the debut NWSL season. Ready to take stock of attendance?

Jeff Kassouf did, pointing to low numbers in New Jersey and Chicago as possible reasons for concern. That’s a good conversation-starter.

I checked in with Sky Blue’s Thomas Hofstetter and Chicago’s Arnim Whisler, who raised a few points:

1. Teams had no time to sell. Whisler: “Most of the table is set for attendance the last month of the PRIOR season. Season ticket sales are strongest during the prior season, we usually have all winter to resell our groups and season ticket holders and this year we started — beyond the hard core standing in line to place an order fans — in February!”

The Red Stars existed in 2012 but could not say what form they would take in 2013 until the NWSL was official.

Most new teams and leagues I’ve seen have been announced a year or so in advance. MLS expansion teams all had plenty of time to ramp up. MLS itself, along with the WUSA and WPS, was years in the making. The NWSL went from announcement to debut in a few months.

Whisler accepts the pressure to improve. “Next year started yesterday — we have many plans league wide to get to the next level in awareness, sponsorship and marketing.”

2. Seasons in the sun. Whisler says Chicago sports tend to build steadily. Spring weather is a factor, as are conflicts with school-year soccer activities and the busy NBA/NHL/MLB overlap. Some MLS teams do indeed struggle with spring, only to rebound later.

3. Locations. Would Sky Blue draw more fans at, say, Red Bull Arena? Probably. But consider this from Hofstetter: “Sky Blue for example cut its stadium cost by 60% over the past three years, which had a bigger impact on our financials then 500 more in the stadium per game.”

And if anyone wants to build an 8,000-seat grass stadium near mass transit in the Chicago area, please call Whisler. That’s not Toyota Park, which is too big for the Red Stars and not exactly downtown. The Red Stars’ current home of Benedictine University is far cheaper for the team and fans, and Whisler says the walkup sales are better in Benedictine than they were at TP.

4. Bottom line. Hofstetter and Whisler say they’re ahead of projections. Some detail from Hofstetter: “For the first time since the beginning of WPS, we are ahead of projections. After 4 games (including season ticket sales and tickets sold for games throughout the season) we generated already more than 50% of our expected ticket sales.”

And the NWSL is built to absorb lower crowds. Hofstetter: “The NWSL is the first league that is set up correctly (including WUSA) and from a SKy Blue FC perspective we are right where we wanted to be in 2013.”

Last word from that perspective, from Hofstetter: “People have to understand that it doesn’t matter what the (attendance) number is. It matters if the revenue generated with tickets are on target and from what I am hearing across the board they are either on target or above expectations for all of the teams at the moment.”

5. The word from the league. I got this statement from NWSL executive director Cheryl Bailey:

“Our goal is to grow the league in many ways as we move forward and attendance will be one area of significance to us. The league is paying close attention to the attendance numbers, but we don’t want to overreact after a small sample of games in the early part of the season. In these early stages we are being patient, along with the clubs.

“As we move along, we’ll continue to have conversations about ways to grow attendance. And at the end of the season we’ll be able to do a much more in-depth evaluation of multiple aspects of the league, including the turnout at stadiums.”

So should we not worry about the crowds?

In the short term, in terms of teams folding, my guess is no. The Red Stars, Sky Blue and Western New York — where WPS attendance was dismal until the World Cup and the Wambach homecoming — have persevered since the WPS days. Sky Blue didn’t draw many fans in WPS, either.

I don’t know enough about anyone’s accounting to know how small is too small when it comes to attendance or how many losses people are willing to incur. Last season, the W-League’s Pali Blues may not have been paying salaries but still managed to bring aboard Sarah Huffman, Whitney Engen, Nikki Washington, Mariah Nogueira, Liz Bogus and company. Attendance for Pali Blues games: 467, 357, 300, 287, 256, 247, 123, 114. They’re still in business. MagicJack was playing for crowds of hundreds with the most expensive women’s soccer team this side of Lyon.

We could just call this season, particularly the early days, as a time to consolidate and build foundations. Teams aren’t spending tons of money just to keep the doors open. And as MLS pioneer Lamar Hunt once said, to build a business, you have to stay in business.

And even in the long term, it’s clear that NWSL teams don’t need giant crowds to survive. Washington’s Bill Lynch said his  club, which includes a reserve team in the W-League and youth operations, would break even at 3,000. Boston’s Dilboy Stadium won’t hold much more than that after renovations.

But … what about perception?

Getting mainstream press coverage these days is difficult. Newspapers are getting smaller. SportsCenter and other highlight shows only have so much time, and they’re trying to focus on bigger sports as cable competition ramps up. More leagues are competing for attention. Major League Lacrosse has teams that average more than 9,000 fans, and when was the last time you saw that get a big segment on SportsCenter?

Then there’s sponsorship. Does a crowd of 1,200 scare away folks with money?

They’re legitimate questions. And by the end of the season, they’ll be big questions. We’re likely to see some regression to the mean — Washington will have weeknight games, which will be challenging for people in Northern Virginia and D.C. trying to battle rush-hour traffic on congested I-270. Chicago and Sky Blue will have more opportune dates.

And when all that has passed, we’ll ask these questions again.

Note: The first version of this post referred to Arnim Whisler and Arnim Wheeler. No idea how I came up with the name Wheeler. I blame Chelsea.

15
rugby

Time for a rugby reality check

Posted on by Beau Dure

Want to know the best place to read up on the quest for professional rugby in the United States?

BigSoccer, of course.

The venerable message board picked up the discussion after The Guardian posted a couple of pieces on RugbyLaw, a startup venture that would set up matches between the London Irish club and a hodgepodge of internationals with newly converted college football players. The hope is that a league would spring from such an effort.

The Guardian‘s headlines, unfortunately, dramatically overstated the NFL’s involvement with the venture. See the comment from RugbyLaw’s George Robertson on this ESPN post.

Issues with the RugbyLaw plan itself, at least as presented in The Guardian:

– Failure to learn from soccer. The NASL (the old one, not the new one) went big, then went home. So did the WUSA. MLS did things differently, and it’s still here. (See Scott Yoshonis’ response at BigSoccer for more on those points.)

– From the story: “If a professional lacrosse league can exist in the US, why not a tournament for the world’s third-most popular team sport?” Probably because the NCAA lacrosse final has been drawing crowds of 40,000 and up for much of the past decade. And because most professional lacrosse players have day jobs and/or play year-round indoor/outdoor.

– The plan is going forward with little more than cautious curiosity from USA Rugby. Oh, great.

Another pro rugby proposal, the American Professional Rugby Competition, seems to be going about things in a more traditional route. They’re not looking for high school stadiums, but they also don’t want crowds to be lost in NFL caverns. They’re studying MLS and talking with NHL, NFL and especially MLS people.

Based on that scant information, I’d think the APRC has the edge. But as with all leagues, it’s not up to those of us in the blogosphere. Whoever convinces investors to step forward will be the winner. All we can really hope for is that whatever emerges is stable. Rugby deserves a long-term league like lacrosse has, not the “three-and-outs” we’ve seen in women’s soccer.

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