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Expansion: Ottawa is still a contender


Luis_Rancagua

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quote:CFL is a lost cause in Ottawa. Too many kicks at the can already.

Correct Ed. And people have concerns with the value of a super roof. Are you comfortable with any part of your tax dollars going towards a franchise that has failed multiple times in the last 15 years?

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"Christ, the guy would go to bed with his mother if he thought he could squeeze out funding. CFL is a lost cause in Ottawa. Too many kicks at the can already."

I wouldn't be so quick to write off the CFL or assume that Ottawa can support a soccer specific stadium (for MLS purposes)...building a stadium which can accomodate more than one sport might be an easier sell in this market...

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Totally disagree. The CFL wants a large television market, whether it is in Ottawa or not. They're not desperate to add a ninth team (scheduling issue) and it's not like there will be a huge entry fee either. The last time they tried to suck money (entry fee) out of a new franchise they ended up crippling it. The league also learned it was to their benefit to make sure the team was competitive early on (and not for fellow teams to protect all players from going to the new franchise).

The fact that football has failed in that market I think we can all agree comes down to some of the worst ownership going. (Glieberman, Chen). The present ownership has deep pockets, a plan, and a proven experienced sports front man. Ottawa was a pretty successful franchise for about one hundred years. Montreal failed and look at them now. How many franchises have shifted in and out of the NFL?

The poll below has been running for quite a while on the Canoe sports pages

1zyblls.jpg

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quote:Originally posted by Ed

Christ, the guy would go to bed with his mother if he thought he could squeeze out funding. CFL is a lost cause in Ottawa. Too many kicks at the can already.

He doesn't seem very different from Melnyk.

quote:Originally posted by Ed

Christ, the guy would go to bed with his mother if he thought he could squeeze out funding. CFL is a lost cause in Ottawa. Too many kicks at the can already.

That is exactly the argument that people use against soccer.

A professional soccer team in Calgary? Too many kicks at the can. Boomers - gone. Kickers - gone. Storm - gone. Failed professional soccer franchises in the early 80's, the late 80's and the 2000's.

Calgary - a soccer graveyard.

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quote:Originally posted by Ed

Christ, the guy would go to bed with his mother if he thought he could squeeze out funding. CFL is a lost cause in Ottawa. Too many kicks at the can already.

He doesn't seem very different from Melnyk.

quote:Originally posted by Ed

Christ, the guy would go to bed with his mother if he thought he could squeeze out funding. CFL is a lost cause in Ottawa. Too many kicks at the can already.

That is exactly the argument that people use against soccer.

A professional soccer team in Calgary? Too many kicks at the can. Boomers - gone. Kickers - gone. Storm - gone. Failed professional soccer franchises in the early 80's, the late 80's and the 2000's.

Calgary - a soccer graveyard.

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Ottawa isn't a blue-collar football town. It's a white-collar soccer town. There are about 50 high schools in Ottawa and all have soccer programs. Football programs have been cut for decades and keep getting cut, down to a third now and probably will be none in another decade. The CFL failed here over and over because no one cares.

What's more, the CFL is simply the cute kid thrown in the photo for a group that wants to develop a piece of prime real estate. They have no interest in football. Never mentioned it before and have basically come out and said they have no interest if that massive 9 or 10 square block chunk of land for development isn't part of the deal.

Taking that huge area of the city and contributing tens of millions of tax dollars and GIVING it to three wealthy and well-connected development groups without a design review, public referendum, tender or competition is nothing short of taxpayer thievery.

If there is a stadium, everyone and their Mother wants it in the Flats. So if we are going to build one that's where it belongs. Then we'll see who's really interested in franchises. And those are the real people who should be running them in the first place.

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Well, judging by the poll apparently there aren't many white collars in Ottawa supporting a soccer stadium. Your statements are just that, your opinion.

My opinion is I don't think you can necessarily link participation numbers with popularity. With no facts behind me I believe football and baseball participation numbers are probably way down from previous decades and yet they are more popular now as spectator sports than ever. Why?

And for a league that many people love to denigrate there is a lot to like about the CFL. How many leagues can go from a near public laughing stock to rebuild themselves into a very successful entity and get back a lost generation of fans.

It always seems like people insinuate soccer participation is way up and that soccer hardly existed in Canada before the advent of the soccer mom and the summer soccer daycare for kids. I played soccer in the 70s on my school team in small town NB and in the early 80s in my high school in small town NS. Every school had a team, people were playing soccer, there is nothing new about this.

Facts are all that are warranted, soccer has yet to translate to a large rating TV sport in North America. I know people wish it were so but it is not and likely will never be. The big three aren't going anywhere soon. I promote Linux like a K-Tel commercial because I think it is better but that still doesn't change the fact that it has only 5% market share.

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I'm guessing you don't know many Ottawans Joe. Baseball died there too. And you may call those sports "more popular now as spectator sports than ever" but in Ottawa no one gives a damn or gave one in a long, long time.

If you go by the number of teams, youth club soccer is probably 20 times bigger than it was in the early 70s. I don't know if that falls under "there is nothing new about this" or not.

Francophone games, and both men's and women's U20's had great crowds. And the reason people are willing to invest $40 million in Ottawa (and Canada) for soccer franchises is because it's the way of the future... the way of the future... the way of the future (sorry... DiCaprio/Scorsese moment).

If CFL franchises had to invest that much we would have no league.

p.s. comparing linux and soccer is a straight red.

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quote:Originally posted by Vic

I'm guessing you don't know many Ottawans Joe. Baseball died there too. And you may call those sports "more popular now as spectator sports than ever" but in Ottawa no one gives a damn or gave one in a long, long time.

To clarify, I meant popularity in general, not specifically in Ottawa, but that poll suggests if people don't give a damn about football, even less give a damn about a professional soccer franchise.

Personally, I think Ottawa has blown a great opportunity to get both franchises. The timing and ownership were right (for both soccer and football). I doubt if the CFL provisional franchise will even survive now.

As for soccer and Linux, both have a niche following and no mass appeal (ie soccer in Can/US) as compared to the main players (baseball, football, Windows)

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Ahh now I hear you and don't really disagree. Don't know if they blew the opportunity though, all they were interested in was free money. They had offers to play together in harmony in a better location and both balked. Throw out the $100 million government giveaways and it would be interesting to see who backs either franchise. My guess is no one. So if the city needs a new stadium, build a great venue where both the community and council want it. After that if anyone wants either franchise, or any sport, give it to them for fair market value. That probably means USL one day, which isn't as great for the soccer community as MLS, but that's still a big step up from PDL and doesn't involve giving away land that could well be used better.

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Maybe in Canada, but globally soccer is as Windows as Bill Gates ;)

Interesting stats:

AVG LEAGUE ATTENDANCE

68k - NFL

34k - England Premiership

26k - Italian Serie A

21k - French Ligue 1

16k - Dutch Eredivisise

16k - Scottish Premier League

17k - NHL

15k - MLS

14k - Brazilian Campeonato

11k - Portuguese Super Liga

Not bad for a league who's salaries are between 2-7% of the NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB and the English Premiership.

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CFL wasn't in the list I used: http://armchairgm.wikia.com/index.php?title=US_Soccer-_MLS_Attendance_Figures_Near_Those_of_NHL_and_NBA

I left out Aussie rules too :)

The CFL is great in Hamilton. Even better on the Prairies. Would probably fly in Halifax. Crash lands in Ottawa.

Somebody wants to prove me wrong, great. But there's a very good chance it fails again, and I have a big problem with using tax dollars to find that out.

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Okay, some news from Ottawa. There is a staff report that the City will not release on the maintenance needs of Frank Clair stadium. All this is conjecture, but the City Hall reporters of both the Sun and the Citizen are saying that the mutterings they hear are that it is a teardown. Councillor Peter Hume has partially confirmed this in an interview with CFRA.

As well, a proposal originally floated in the Citizen by one of the columnists is that the City tear down Frank Clair and the Civic Centre, incorporate some elements of the Lansdowne proposal (new shops etc along Bank), and use those revenues combined with the $3.8 Million cost savings from Lansdowne to build an 8000 seat hockey arena and a civic park at Lansdowne and pay for their share of the stadium in Kanata. At the same time, they are to aggresively lobby the feds and province to pay a one-third share. And, Melnyk and Hunt are to work together to make the stadium fit for both teams.

Finally, the VERY large scale Kanata West development, which had been held up due to legitimate water runoff concerns appears to be back on track. This will mean an additional 10,000 households around the proposed stadium site over the next 20 years and will also ensure that the proposed rapidbus links get built there.

Long story short - these are all promising developments.

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The Ottawa Sun has four of it's sports journalists on a weekly discussion on various topics. This past week (Wed, April 8th) it was the turn of the football/soccer stadiums situation. Some comments made during their discussion are below. Hope their feelings aren't the same as most of those making the final decision as I wouldn't have much hope if that was the case.

TIM BAINES: Full disclosure. While I can appreciate soccer, I'm not a fan. I played college football. I coach football. I love football. Getting past my obvious bias, Lansdowne Live is the only bid that should be considered. The park is an eyesoar, a drain on tax dollars ... and it needs to be revitalized

BRUCE GARRIOCH: Don't think this council will do the right thing. They never have before. It's ridiculous. My belief is Eugene Melnyk might just halt his bid for soccer, anyway.

DON BRENNAN: They won't choose the obvious smart bid, the right bid, the Lansdowne Live bid. They won't choose it because that land is too valuable to the city.

BAINES: Lansdowne is the right location and the CFL can and will work here. I've got a lot of respect for Eugene Melnyk, but how could he ever make up the $50 million he's willing to plunk down for an MLS team? And why the hell would anybody pay $50 million for a soccer team in Canada? Once the honeymoon is over, will 20,000 fans still be packing the stands five years from now (see past baseball history in Ottawa)?

GARRIOCH: Chris (Stevenson) and I told Eugene a long time ago not to go for this soccer team. People like to play the game here. They don't like to watch it.

BAINES: I won't go as far as to say they won't watch it. Look at the success of the FIFA event at Lansdowne. People will watch. They just don't need to drive all the way out to Kanata to watch it. Weren't there (and aren't there still) people who complain about the Senators playing in the far reaches of Kanata?

GARRIOCH: Soccer fans tell me they don't like the MLS. That it's not great soccer to watch. This is second-hand info -- but from a couple of people who actually enjoy and coach the game.

BRENNAN: I don't think we can say it will work or it won't work. We don't know how the fans will receive a soccer team. Maybe it will go over big, like in Toronto, or maybe it will be another Intrepid experience. But we do know that the CFL has been around for 100-plus years, and that Ottawa has a football following. A sweet stadium and strong local ownership will bring them out in droves.

BAINES: I like my councillor, Diane Deans. I hope she has the foresight to stand behind what's right -- that's the Lansdowne Live proposal.

[B)]

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quote:Originally posted by gwsmith63

TIM BAINES: Full disclosure. While I can appreciate soccer, I'm not a fan. I played college football. I coach football. I love football. Getting past my obvious bias, Lansdowne Live is the only bid that should be considered. The park is an eyesoar, a drain on tax dollars ... and it needs to be revitalized

[B)]

What I think a lot of people don't understand is thet the LL proposal will not actually revitalise Lansdowne. It will leave the Parking lots as parking lots, rebuild the stadium and give a sweetheart deal to develop the bank street portion of Lansdowne to the CFL group. And Lansdowne will remain an "eyesoar" [sic]

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