CPL new teams speculation

[RS]

1 hour ago, Ams1984 said:

The whole MLS structure is absurd. It’s designed to produce American players, we’re guests in their league. 

College drafts are the primary vehicle for player acquisition in MLS (at least they have been, some clubs now have academies). Those drafts take a 22/3 yr old (who has already missed his most formative football years by playing at an amateur college level) and plop him on the bench of an MLS club while he ‘develops’ until he’s in his mid-late twenties! Naturally the vast majority of drafted players are American. 

The Canadian clubs in MLS just happen to be located in Canada. Like franchises from other American leagues, the location of the actual franchise has little to nothing to do with its roster composition. This is perhaps what I hate most about MLS. I love that most soccer clubs around the world have several locally produced players. 
 

Over the last few years, the Canadian MLS clubs have started to make some effort to produce their own players, but there is no incentive for them to do it, so it remains fairly ancillary. They could just as easily (and without having to do any development at all) field a bunch of American college players. TFC might have ‘as many Canadians as Americans’ but that in and of itself is ridiculous! Americans should be foreign players in our clubs, just as we are in theirs. 

Very little of this has been true about MLS for about a decade. 

The days of American college kids dominating the landscape of the league are long gone. MLS has its (many) flaws, but I wish people on here would update their arguments to show that they’re actually informed rather than relying on tired stereotypes.

And ya, none of this never ending conversation has anything to do with the CPL...

[IAmPappy]

Since this is the “CPL new teams speculation” thread, I was just wondering ...

What do you guys think about the 3 Cdn MLS clubs eventually joining the CPL, possibly forced to do so by FIFA?

Edited February 16, 2020 by IAmPappy

[Ams1984]

24 minutes ago, RS said:

Very little of this has been true about MLS for about a decade. 

The days of American college kids dominating the landscape of the league are long gone. MLS has its (many) flaws, but I wish people on here would update their arguments to show that they’re actually informed rather than relying on tired stereotypes.

And ya, none of this never ending conversation has anything to do with the CPL...

I watch lots of MLS, and I have done since ‘96. It’s not a stereotype, it’s a fact. The college draft is the primary vehicle for player ‘development’ in MLS. It may be less true than in 1996 but it remains true. And all of this has to do with CPL because the truth of it reinforces the need for the CPL. 

[RS]

2 minutes ago, Ams1984 said:

I watch lots of MLS, and I have done since ‘96. It’s not a stereotype, it’s a fact. The college draft is the primary vehicle for player ‘development’ in MLS. It may be less true than in 1996 but it remains true. And all of this has to do with CPL because the truth of it reinforces the need for the CPL. 

No, the college draft is not the primary vehicle for player development in MLS. It hasn’t been so for years. 

This isn’t the right place to debate this, but if you wish to continue feel free to go ahead and tell me what, say, the No. 8 pick from each of the last 5 drafts (not including this year) are doing right now.

With much more emphasis on homegrowns and purchasing players from Latin America, it’s become near impossible for the overwhelming majority of drat picks to become MLS regulars nowadays. Most go to USL.

As for CPL, it was needed simply because there were not enough professional opportunities for Canadian players. The existence of the MLS draft has never had any influence on that, and never well.

[Ams1984]

13 minutes ago, RS said:

No, the college draft is not the primary vehicle for player development in MLS. It hasn’t been so for years. 

This isn’t the right place to debate this, but if you wish to continue feel free to go ahead and tell me what, say, the No. 8 pick from each of the last 5 drafts (not including this year) are doing right now.

With much more emphasis on homegrowns and purchasing players from Latin America, it’s become near impossible for the overwhelming majority of drat picks to become MLS regulars nowadays. Most go to USL.

As for CPL, it was needed simply because there were not enough professional opportunities for Canadian players. The existence of the MLS draft has never had any influence on that, and never well.

I think you’re missing my point, and we’re sort of talking past each other. As you say, this isn’t really the place anyways, so cheers. 

[Bison44]

Well i did one quick snapshot.  I picked Minnesota at random, and 16/27 players came from colleges. Maybe they are an outlier, but I doubt it.  Check some other teams if you have spare time.  I dont know about any specific #8 pick but huge chunks of rosters are made up of college players.  

 

[nfitz]

1 hour ago, IAmPappy said:

What do you guys think about the 3 Cdn MLS clubs eventually joining the CPL, possibly forced to do so by FIFA?

I don't see it happening for years - especially with the CPL cap on each players salary being only $750K. Given that's less than the TFC average per player, they'd have to shed a lot of players - which is not in the interest of the fans who want to watch good football.

Perhaps we should be speculating on new teams here, not MLS teams, which clearly aren't going to be moving to CPL anytime this decade.
 

Edited February 16, 2020 by nfitz

[RS]

19 minutes ago, Bison44 said:

Well i did one quick snapshot.  I picked Minnesota at random, and 16/27 players came from colleges. Maybe they are an outlier, but I doubt it.  Check some other teams if you have spare time.  I dont know about any specific #8 pick but huge chunks of rosters are made up of college players.  

 

My point is that even most early first-rounders don’t tend to stick with MLS teams any longer. 

And yes, Minnesota is an outlier. 

[Ian Kennedy]

Interesting topic. I"llstart by stating I'm not an expert- One point of reference for consideration and one perspective:  Let's start with the perspective.  As humans, we pay attention to what's closest and most convenient.  For the MLS to track players on college teams is convenient.  For colleges to "target" MLS teams for their players is convenient.  It's a natural result of geography and accessibility.  The point of reference is my son Scott and a 4th draft pick for Dallas, Callum Montgomery.  They have some similarities and some material differences.  The difference useful for this discussion is that Callum played College Soccer in the US.  I suspect most MLS teams have no knowledge of Scott Kennedy.

[Unnamed Trialist]

6 hours ago, narduch said:

Someone really needs to start a separate thread on sanctioning and move the debate there. So this thread can be about CPL expansion again. 

Not gonna happen 😂

[youllneverwalkalone]

19 hours ago, RS said:

My point is that even most early first-rounders don’t tend to stick with MLS teams any longer. 

And yes, Minnesota is an outlier. 

I think the reply to this is that many players entering NCAA now are doing so as homegrown. NCAA still plays a huge role in the developmental system in MLS. But it doesn't happen through the draft anymore. The whole USSDA agenda is bring players into NCAA, and they've been quite dominant in this regard.

Of all the fucked up things about MLS, the relationship with NCAA is near the bottom of my list. Like the US, Canadian Universities have an athletic infrastructure that would be crazy to ignore in the developmental process. It's also a platform to scout and sign foreign players with very little risk. If you had $1m to spend on transfer fees, I suspect you'd get much more bang for your buck by send 100 18 year olds to 4 years of university and then signing the top 10 or so. If anything, MLS has gotten away from this aspect of recruitment. $1m used to be precious to MLS and now they will throw it in a dumpster and watch it burn like any large European side. Caps took a $1m flyer on a 22 year old from a lower table club in Israel ffs.

[m-g-williams]

Thoughts?

[BuzzAndSting]

4 minutes ago, m-g-williams said:

Thoughts?

I believe Totera's roll has been mostly reaching out to youth clubs to explain and promote the CPL and how it fits into the Canadian professional pathway. I don't think this has to do with expansion.

[Unnamed Trialist]

47 minutes ago, m-g-williams said:

Thoughts?

Looks like a great turnout for something merely informative.

[Initial B]

1 hour ago, BuzzAndSting said:

I believe Totera's roll has been mostly reaching out to youth clubs to explain and promote the CPL and how it fits into the Canadian professional pathway. I don't think this has to do with expansion.

That's exactly what he does. I was at a presentation in Ottawa last year and he was selling it to the youth players and their parents. Unfortunately, one of my takeaways from what he said was that an Ontario player's best chance at getting scouted was to be playing in L1O by the time you are U18, kind of defeating the purpose of OPDL...

[Chad_Impact]

 

[deschamp86]

11 minutes ago, Chad_Impact said:

 

Coincidence?

[narduch]

If Nef said it, its happening....eventually.

[Ams1984]

Hopefully both clubs would join at once... that way the CPL could keep the single table balanced schedule. 

[Ams1984]

44 minutes ago, Lofty said:

Unfortunately, not really.

10 teams would be:

* 9×4 = 36 matches, which seems like too many;

* 9×2 = 18 matches, which seems like too few;

* 9×3 = 27 matches which is about right except that half the teams would play one additional home match, so not really "balanced".

It will be interesting to see what weird and wonderful format they dream up for a ten team league, if it materializes. I hope they don't drop the number of league matches below 28 though.

Yeah, my math sucks. Yay spatial dyslexia! I guess that would be a tricky one to balance. I guess the most important thing, in my opinion, is that they stick to a single table and be as balanced as possible. I’m pretty keen on the current format, or some variation of it, and I hope it sticks... but I do want the league to grow (in a stable fashion). 

[Cheeta]

1 hour ago, Lofty said:

 

...

 

* 9×3 = 27 matches which is about right except that half the teams would play one additional home match, so not really "balanced".

It will be interesting to see what weird and wonderful format they dream up for a ten team league, if it materializes. I hope they don't drop the number of league matches below 28 though.

Yeah, a bit of a mess.  Balanced will be a subjective term.

Could do a sort of split I suppose.  1st half of the season a full league home and away, that'll get you to 18 fixtures, then the 2nd half of the season split the league at the Manitoba/Ontario border and do another home and away within either half of the country.  That'll add 8 more fixtures so you're at 26.  EDIT;  Or the reverse.  Conference 1st, then league wide to finish the year.  Bring new teams in to drive interest in the 2nd half of the season.   

OH! And if they stick with the a three team playoff tourney to see the season out you could have an east-west semi-final (I prefer Sunrise-Sunset semi-final) to see who gets a crack at the league champion.

Of course that means your team would only host the 5 teams from the opposite conference once.  Not too keen on that. 

[m-g-williams]

5 hours ago, Lofty said:

Unfortunately, not really.

10 teams would be:

* 9×4 = 36 matches, which seems like too many;

* 9×2 = 18 matches, which seems like too few;

* 9×3 = 27 matches which is about right except that half the teams would play one additional home match, so not really "balanced".

It will be interesting to see what weird and wonderful format they dream up for a ten team league, if it materializes. I hope they don't drop the number of league matches below 28 though.

Eh, it's not so bad. The A-League in Australia did that for years. Their solution was the 27 match set up, with alternating years. Half the league gets an extra home match one year, then the other half the next year. 

[gigi riva]

Quebec City and Saskatoon if true would be good , I would like to see another team in the East coast like Moncton  

[baulderdash77]

From a coverage perspective Saskatoon and Quebec City make lots of sense.  It grows the base of professional soccer in Canada to 2 underserved markets.   Some of the other proposed cities will to varying degrees cannibalize existing markets.  These 2 cities will not which is good for the growth of the game.

[m-g-williams]

10 hours ago, gigi riva said:

Quebec City and Saskatoon if true would be good , I would like to see another team in the East coast like Moncton  

Agreed. I think it would be great to have an East Coast rival for Halifax, as well as a Francophone rival for Quebec City. The location would draw fans not just from NB but also PEI, they have a perfectly sized stadium, and the economy of the city/region still seems to be doing quite well. Other teams in Moncton (Wildcats and Magic) tend to draw decently well as they're the biggest fish in a smaller pond. I think a team there could do well. 

Edited March 4, 2020 by m-g-williams