CPL General

[Unnamed Trialist]

22 hours ago, CDNFootballer said:

No need to paint, just use Nexxfield portable turf like Impact at Olympic stadium and New York Cosmos last year in Brooklyn, company is located in Quebec I believe and the stuff is FIFA approved, takes about 12 hrs to put down and take up. $500K.

 

I heard of an innovation maybe 12 years ago that I have never seen implemented, and I wonder why. 

It was a day I took my then 6-year old to play soccer at a tournament celebrating a club's new field turf facilities. 

It was explained to me that they had considered a system whereby the lines on the field could be illuminated fibres. The idea was that as part of the overall surface, those strands of field turf grass corresponding to any of the lines (they were thinking full length vs crossways 7 a side) would have optical components in them, and that you would be able to light one or another configuration digitally. Basically, that you would lay out all planned grids this way, and would choose the one you want and activate it. It made sense, but I suppose the cost has never made it viable. 

I still find it incredible that something being talked of 13 years ago at a small club, that sounded quite ingenious, has never panned out.

Edited June 3, 2018 by Unnamed Trialist

[matty]

15 hours ago, Complete Homer said:

Personally, I think casual fans will have way more problems understanding the lack of playoffs than roster rules, they'll just ignore the latter. 

I know the absence of playoffs is popular in the hardcore soccer demographic, but in my casual canvassing it seems like a turn off for casual fans. Hopefully it doesn't matter much since atmosphere>rules for casual fans

I fully agree with you. I do feel the absence of playoffs could be a turn off that bothers the casual fan. While i applaud the league for the ambition to try and create a canadian soccer culture, it seems somewhat risky to ignore the preexisting sporting culture we have. I could easily see a decent chunk of casuals or those just getting into the sport saying "what the fuck was that?" when a team is deemed champion with 3 games left after a draw but could also see the atmosphere keeping that frustration at bay. I'm more concerned about doing single table no playoffs or pro/rel for several seasons (possibly forever) than fans not digging adopting the Euro style.

[Bison44]

At least give us a final east vs west championship game.  It doesnt have to be anymore complicated than that.  If they start with 8 teams, you could very easily have 4 (or half the league) teams fighting for a spot in the final on the final weekend.  

[Watchmen]

23 minutes ago, Bison44 said:

At least give us a final east vs west championship game.  It doesnt have to be anymore complicated than that.  If they start with 8 teams, you could very easily have 4 (or half the league) teams fighting for a spot in the final on the final weekend.  

It's one table.  No east or west conference to have a "championship game" with.

[Bison44]

It is?  For a league that doesnt have all its teams yet, let alone stadiums for said teams and is almost a year off from starting, I would think they could work in playoffs if they dont already have plans in place.  

[matty]

59 minutes ago, Bison44 said:

It is?  For a league that doesnt have all its teams yet, let alone stadiums for said teams and is almost a year off from starting, I would think they could work in playoffs if they dont already have plans in place.  

I somewhat hope so so it's somewhat more accessible. I do like the idea of a kind of mini championship game but yea it seems like they want to go single table asap and if they have less than 8 teams they can't do conferences.

[Complete Homer]

8 hours ago, Bison44 said:

It is?  For a league that doesnt have all its teams yet, let alone stadiums for said teams and is almost a year off from starting, I would think they could work in playoffs if they dont already have plans in place.  

I agree with 8 teams it's a little silly, but longer term it might be a barrier for engagement for some people 

I see the conversion of someone to being a soccer fan as clearing multiple hurdles. Just one of the hurdles is the need to become emotionally invested in the objective of the competition's format. The objective being unfamiliar (ie no playoff winner) makes this hurdle a bit more difficult to overcome.

It's not the end of the world, I'm not calling it a terrible decision, I'm just thinking that the league's only route to scaling up is converting standard issue Canadians of my generation (likely grew up playing soccer at some point but never had anything to attach fandom to so never followed the sport as a fan) and you want to make it as easy of a transition as possible for those types.

Again, not the worst problem to have. The most important part is drawing people in with atmosphere, and maybe having a more traditional format draws in the purists in larger numbers to generate that crucial environment.

I'm sure they've thought through the decision more than I have, just my thoughts. 

[Keegan]

I think we need a study here because I see it totally different.  I think any fan of any sport wants their league format to mirror that of the top level in that sport.  In hockey that is playoffs but in soccer, whether you are a hardcore fan or not, you recognize that as a league table.  

Baby boomers may be less understanding but millennials are connected and understand.  They see just as much European soccer as nhl hockey coverage through the web and tv and their perception of top level soccer is a league table akin to the premier league.  Playoffs still exist but they take shape in the form of domestic and continental cup competitions.  

I even have non soccer fans ask me why MLS has playoffs - to a lot of people it’s odd not to follow the traditional model.  Imagine if the KHL operated a league table and tried to copy their football league.. hardcore or not that just looks bush league and fewer people give it a chance.

Tradition starts at the top and flows down.  It’s like if a lawyer came in a Canadian tuxedo.. he may be the best lawyer out there and a few people may know that but to a casual person who knows nothing they know that’s not how a lawyer is supposed to look and write them off. 

Even to use MLS as an example.. the league was a joke it’s first 10 years as it had an amateur image... football lines, Mickey Mouse team names, lack of stadiums or culture.  Suddenly you get team names like “Toronto fc” “Orlando city” “Atlanta united” and the league is taken more and more serious.  KC wizards were a joke but Sporting KC is a whole new ball game.  The more MLS has moved toward European/South American styles the more it has grown. 

Edited June 4, 2018 by Keegan

[matty]

54 minutes ago, Keegan said:

I think we need a study here because I see it totally different.  I think any fan of any sport wants their league format to mirror that of the top level in that sport.  In hockey that is playoffs but in soccer, whether you are a hardcore fan or not, you recognize that as a league table.  

That is and isn't true. Playoffs are fairly tradition depending on where you are in the world (as I've gone over) and the use of knock-out rounds in major competition (such as the World Cup) shows they're not foreign for major events.

In the continental Americas, playoffs deciding the champion is as common if not more than table.

54 minutes ago, Keegan said:

Baby boomers may be less understanding but millennials are connected and understand.  They see just as much European soccer as nhl hockey coverage through the web and tv and their perception of top level soccer is a league table akin to the premier league.  Playoffs still exist but they take shape in the form of domestic and continental cup competitions.  

Millennials do not really watch sports. They do follow MLS and ELP but it's at a dropped rate from say Gen X. Domestic cups are not playoffs at all (playoffs are about the best of the best while cups are typically open).

54 minutes ago, Keegan said:

Even to use MLS as an example.. the league was a joke it’s first 10 years as it had an amateur image... football lines, Mickey Mouse team names, lack of stadiums or culture.  Suddenly you get team names like “Toronto fc” “Orlando city” “Atlanta united” and the league is taken more and more serious.  KC wizards were a joke but Sporting KC is a whole new ball game.  The more MLS has moved toward European/South American styles the more it has grown. 

That has more to do with spending changes than anything else. People like stars man. Also LA Galaxy remain one of the post popular teams with fans and foreign talent and teams have since arrived in the league with the names Impact, Timbers and Sounders (none of which are very traditional and have not hurt the leagues image). On top of that the traditionism has resulted in serious mocking such as two Uniteds debuting in one year and Real Salt Lake. Just to add the playoffs the MLS (and a lot of South America) use and the all-star game remain some of the most watched games they do every year.

Edited June 4, 2018 by matty

[Keegan]

I know the top 3 leagues in South America all use a table to decide the champion and in Uruguay they have the two league champions face off for a winner (similar to nasl).  

Perhaps you need pro/rel to make a single table league truly fulfill its purpose of having every match matter.  We could get creative with it though and have league standings determine Voyageurs cup seeding though.. I.e if you finish last you have to play in against a L1O team and then once you beat them play against an mls side. This would also ensure that the leagues best sides are facing mls teams later on for bigger matches and better tv ratings.. because let’s face it the CPL v MLS showdowns are going to be something special... I don’t think in sport there is even a comparison. 

Millenials dont watch sports?  To be clear that is the generation from 1980 to 99 which certainly makes up a huge portion of sports fans. 

Edited June 4, 2018 by Keegan

[ted]

12 hours ago, Bison44 said:

At least give us a final east vs west championship game.  It doesnt have to be anymore complicated than that.  If they start with 8 teams, you could very easily have 4 (or half the league) teams fighting for a spot in the final on the final weekend.  

We already get a "championship" game: the VCup. People can easily figure out difference between the league and the cup champion. It's a part of the world soccer culture that works and makes our sport unique and interesting in the sports landscape.

There can be good value in NOT doing the same thing every other sport does.

[Ansem]

37 minutes ago, ted said:

We already get a "championship" game: the VCup. People can easily figure out difference between the league and the cup champion. It's a part of the world soccer culture that works and makes our sport unique and interesting in the sports landscape.

There can be good value in NOT doing the same thing every other sport does.

Second that

Also, by opening the tournament to all teams in D3, you could run the tournament concurrently with the CPL season.

They could arrange the final to be the week after CPL last game.

[Kent]

3 hours ago, Keegan said:

We could get creative with it though and have league standings determine Voyageurs cup seeding though.. I.e if you finish last you have to play in against a L1O team and then once you beat them play against an mls side. This would also ensure that the leagues best sides are facing mls teams later on for bigger matches and better tv ratings.. because let’s face it the CPL v MLS showdowns are going to be something special... I don’t think in sport there is even a comparison. 

I think the issue with this is that you can't rank the MLS teams against the CPL teams. I think the CSA wants to label both leagues as tier 1, so it would be counter to that goal to essentially automatically seed MLS teams as higher than CPL teams in the Voyageurs Cup.

As for the suggestion that people have made that pro/rel solves the problem of meaningless games towards the end of the season, I would like to point out (again I guess, I'm sure I've probably said this 100 pages ago in this thread) that the soccer leagues that are most popular for fans in Canada are the big leagues like La Liga, EPL, Bundesliga, and Serie A. The teams that tend to be followed in those leagues are the perennial contenders. And there is another aspect that those leagues have going for them that CPL isn't likely to have in the early years at least. It's not quite win or bust in those leagues. It's win or finish top 3 for a guaranteed Champions League spot or finish top 4 for a Champions League playoff, or finish 5th or 6th for a Europa league spot. I might be off on the spots for some leagues, but the point is that there are other things to shoot for in the single table format. I would guess that CPL would probably have 0, or maybe 1, or at a stretch 2, spots available for continental competition. If it's 0 or 1 spot it doesn't change much in terms of expanding the number of important games (just makes the top prize more valuable if there is a spot up for grabs). Only once we get 2 spots that are determined by CPL league play that the lower spots on the table start having a more tangible prize to them aside from bragging rights.

[IAmPappy]

As much as I enjoy playoff hockey, it’s the lengthy playoff hockey that makes the lengthy regular season nearly irrelevant. That’s the value of a short single table CPL season: Every game will matter. And, for my playoff fix, I look forward to the expanded V-Cup!

[Bison44]

3 hours ago, ted said:

We already get a "championship" game: the VCup. People can easily figure out difference between the league and the cup champion. It's a part of the world soccer culture that works and makes our sport unique and interesting in the sports landscape.

There can be good value in NOT doing the same thing every other sport does.

So by doing things exactly the way every other soccer league does it is being unique and interesting??  Not following other sports like sheep is good, but following other soccer leagues like sheep is ok??   Just checking.....

[IAmPappy]

9 minutes ago, Bison44 said:

So by doing things exactly the way every other soccer league does it is being unique and interesting??  Not following other sports like sheep is good, but following other soccer leagues like sheep is ok??   Just checking.....

Yes. You got it now ?

[C2SKI]

Do we have any idea how rosters are going to be managed? Is the league going to control things like MLS?

[CDNFootballer]

2 hours ago, C2SKI said:

Do we have any idea how rosters are going to be managed? Is the league going to control things like MLS?

Like  how single entity MLS employs all the players in the league and such? CPL is not following that single entity model at all thankfully.

[CDNFootballer]

As for playoffs, I like the idea of none and having the CPL champion being the top of the table club each season.

If they ever went to playoffs though, a system like NASL with the top 4 clubs qualifying and single game semi finals and final would work well, 3 simple, meaningful matches, with everything on the line.

Just stay away from the dreadful MLS system of the regular season being mostly meaningless with a ton of franchises in the playoffs that drag out till Dec and by that time mostly nobody cares.

[matty]

9 hours ago, Keegan said:

I know the top 3 leagues in South America all use a table to decide the champion and in Uruguay they have the two league champions face off for a winner (similar to nasl).  

Perhaps you need pro/rel to make a single table league truly fulfill its purpose of having every match matter.  We could get creative with it though and have league standings determine Voyageurs cup seeding though.. I.e if you finish last you have to play in against a L1O team and then once you beat them play against an mls side. This would also ensure that the leagues best sides are facing mls teams later on for bigger matches and better tv ratings.. because let’s face it the CPL v MLS showdowns are going to be something special... I don’t think in sport there is even a comparison. 

Millenials dont watch sports?  To be clear that is the generation from 1980 to 99 which certainly makes up a huge portion of sports fans. 

Liga MX (the most popular league in North America) uses playoffs. As do Panama, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala and Belize and Costa Rica uses a variant. So playoffs are the outright standard in North America.

In addition to Uruguay (who use a variant), Colombia, Bolivia and Venezuela do as well.

The V Cup thing should be done but the issue is whether casuals will care outright. They could but could take awhile to get folks stoked about entering in the 2nd V Cup round. CPL vs. MLS games are also no lock on a big deal until the CPL can beat the MLS I don't see MLS fans caring about them as much. VCup also from what I've heard does meh on TV at the current time.

Millenials follow select sports when you look at the data. UFC, NBA and especially eSports do very well but others like MLB and NFL do poor. Soccer does kinda mixed with them. The drop down from Gen X is like 10% fewer  (so in the 30-35% range I think). They also follow sports differently (stuff like Twitter and Instagram clips are the main way of viewing for like 5% of them and that a hard method to turn into money).

Edited June 5, 2018 by matty

[matty]

4 hours ago, IAmPappy said:

As much as I enjoy playoff hockey, it’s the lengthy playoff hockey that makes the lengthy regular season nearly irrelevant. That’s the value of a short single table CPL season: Every game will matter. And, for my playoff fix, I look forward to the expanded V-Cup!

Not if you team totally sucks 100% and goes 0-0-10 during the first half of the season. Then it's just "FUCK FUCK FUCK I HATE EVERYONE FUCK I'm watching the new XFL instead."

[Unnamed Trialist]

IMO there has to be a single table and the winner wins the league.That team should get our Champions League spot. It was the best team over the course of the season, and it therefore had the consistency and depth of roster, and quality coaching week in week out, to handle the rigours of a Champions League. The other is the winner of the Voyageurs Cup, which is a sort of playoff with every team playing, and that team has another virtue: ability to handle knock-outs that are home and away.

Now if someone thinks playoffs are better, that is fine, but I am not sure fans really need them. It may be a motivation during the season, it could be argued (fight to make them, making the league more lively until the end). But just the same there could be other motivations, like seedings for the Voyageurs Cup, just an idea.

Last year's MLS playoffs were a huge anti-climax, they let a FIFA break split it, there was no continuity. How many MLS across North America fans watched that last game? I am not saying in retrospect it was not a great win for TFC, but the whole process was a let down. There is no evidence that in long playoff processes, there is a rising mood of interest, just as likely there is a sort of half watching and disengagement from fans whose teams are not involved, so playoffs can create a drop-off effect, a downward curve of interest. Depending how they are handled.

I think MLS has an okay model, if the CPL were to do it quicker it could work. Top two teams have a bye, 3 plays vs. 6th at home, 4th plays at home vs. 5th. Then semis, you could do home and away. Then a final. That is already a month of playoffs 4 matches. For what exactly?

 

[C2SKI]

Without relegation or playoffs, games near the end of the season could become meaningless for much of the league. That being said, I'd still prefer a single table to decide the champion. My biggest worry is that we'll end up with teams intentionally throwing games in a race to the bottom for draft picks. I despise that

[Watchmen]

The major flaw with Single Table and no playoffs is when there's no promotion/relegation.  I know the CanPL is talking about that, but that's a ways off (if they're even able to implement it).  So you're going to end up with teams at the bottom of the table and nothing to play for.  That's hard to sell to fans.

[Watchmen]

4 minutes ago, C2SKI said:

Without relegation or playoffs, games near the end of the season could become meaningless for much of the league. That being said, I'd still prefer a single table to decide the champion. My biggest worry is that we'll end up with teams intentionally throwing games in a race to the bottom for draft picks. I despise that

We had the same thought.  Though I don't see the draft being a big deal in this league, so I don't see the intentional tanking as something that will happen.