CPL General

[BillyBob]

Ah good old hyperventilating internets.

Anyway, who is going to be the 8th team now?

[Ansem]

3 hours ago, Gopherbashi said:

Interesting back and forth here - some actual salary figures are nice to see and FuryFanatic indicates the cap is likely less than $800k.

 

Crepeau is on loan soooo......

[Complete Homer]

2 minutes ago, Ansem said:

Crepeau is on loan soooo......

Reid too, no?

[Ansem]

7 minutes ago, Complete Homer said:

Reid too, no?

Exactly... from FC Dallas

Counting their salary is misleading. That's why I don't buy Fury Fanatic claims on CPL finances 

Edited September 6, 2018 by Ansem

[Raven]

Oh no...the sky is falling.....Seriously, if starting a league is in anyway like starting a business (which I have done)...shit happens and you move on and make it successful with hard work, marketing and a good product. I'm tired of the negativity on this board.....☹️

[Rocket Robin]

We'll see how good (and deep) Ottawa Fury is in the next two nights. I wonder who is responsible for scheduling the friendly against Montreal Impact the night after they'll have to make a six hour bus ride back from Toronto.  

From the Fury's website:

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With a busy next few days ahead of them, Fury FC will get the chance to display the full depth of their roster, first in a USL regular season match against Toronto FC II, before hosting the Montreal Impact on Friday night. If Thursday’s match has serious implications for Ottawa’s push for the playoffs, the Friday one will be a golden opportunity to showcase the young talent that is keeping this team on track.

While recent results may not have made it easy, Fury FC know their path to a USL playoff spot is still firmly in their hands, and it will start with getting a result in Toronto on Thursday night. Sitting only three points out of a post-season position with six games to play, Ottawa will look to snap the current streak and return to its goal scoring form against the Ontario rivals.

Confident, Fury FC will also have to get the result without goalkeeper Maxime Crépeau, still USL co-leader in clean sheets, since he is away on international duty as Canada face the U.S. Virgin Islands on Sunday in Concacaf Nations League qualifying. Fury will also be without defender Eddie Edward who has received a one-game suspension following the unfortunate red card he received in the match against New York.

Ottawa will face a Toronto FC II squad that has built some momentum, claiming a 4-1 victory against Louisville City FC last Tuesday, before falling to Atlanta United 2 on Friday. Moreover, with Toronto FC’s A-team on a bye week, Fury FC could be facing some additional opposition in the likes of Canadians Ashtone Morgan and Jordan Hamilton.

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Well maybe not Morgan because he missed the LAFC match because of injury so will likely use the MLS break to rest.  Liam Fraser who also is on the yo-yo between teams is away in Florida for the game against US Virgin Islands to take the place of the injured Jay Chapman.  

 

Maybe the owner who doesn't want to slash payroll to join the CanPL could splurge and fly them out from the Billy Bishop Airport (about 10 minutes away) or are charter flights outlawed by the spendthrift USL rules?  

Edited September 6, 2018 by Rocket Robin
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[SpursFlu]

How would you start a professional sports league from scratch and not be scrambling? Sounds like a piece of cake right?

[grande]

On 2/13/2018 at 6:30 PM, lazlo_80 said:

I'll bet anyone here $100 Ottawa Fury are a CPL team in 2019.

Too many of these CanCon pick ups smell fishy. 

There has to be one of you willing to put your money where your mouth is.

The bet is simple: If Ottawa Fury play in the CPL in 2019 I get your $100, if they don't I'll send you $100. Personal details for sending the cash can be hashed out either through DMs or a third person on here for the especially paranoid.

Anyone interested?

I'm disappointed Ottawa's not in, but then I remembered I took this bet so... Silver lining?  

[lazlo_80]

1 hour ago, grande said:

I'm disappointed Ottawa's not in, but then I remembered I took this bet so... Silver lining?  

dang it!

[shamrock]

I think (purely speculating here) the league overplayed it's hand in trying to forcing Ottawa to disperse it's players to other members. Let them have the upper hand in season 1. But now Fury shouldn't be talking about what's good for Canadian soccer 'cause obviously they don't care. 

As for the salary cap, I've said from day one 1,5 million wasn't realistic. 

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

We now have a mainstream media sports journalist from the Ottawa region's French language daily stating that CPL players will be making a fraction of USL players' salaries. Think that pretty much confirms the 500k thing now when taken together with all the other sources.

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

6 hours ago, SpursFlu said:

How would you start a professional sports league from scratch and not be scrambling? Sounds like a piece of cake right?

If you have significantly more interested investors with viable stadium solutions than the minimum number needed to have a sensible looking launch, you can afford to set the standards that need to be set to have the quality of entertainment product you want because the weaker links can safely be allowed to fall by the wayside.

Under that scenario there is likely to be a lot less scrambling happening behind the scenes to come up with a format on things like salary caps and accommodation for players from out of town that keep the weaker links on board but is well below what your stronger would be members, for the sake of argument let's call them the Fury, want.

The problem with the 8 team format used by the CSL initially back in 1987 and with CanPL now for 2019, which is a product as much as anything else of the limited number of large markets in Canada with suitable stadia for pro soccer, is that once you drop to 7 for any reason you have an existential crisis on your hands, if you can't quickly replace them with a stable franchise that the other 7 are confident in.

Edited September 6, 2018 by BringBackTheBlizzard

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

4 hours ago, shamrock said:

...But now Fury shouldn't be talking about what's good for Canadian soccer 'cause obviously they don't care...

...or they are simply pointing out that the Emperor has no clothes where trying to launch a D1 sanctioned league with a miniscule salary cap is concerned. If all some of the owners are willing to do revolves around a junior hockey level of approach to remuneration and accommodation then maybe it's time to examine some of the assumptions people are making about what the league needs to be in order to be able do something good for Canadian soccer and come up with a different strategy? Jim Easton (yes I know he's involved with CanPL now) recommended a regional D3 approach with a U-23 focus in the not too distant past.  Maybe, it's time to look at that format more closely again?

[rob.notenboom]

5 hours ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said:

We now have a mainstream media sports journalist from the Ottawa region's French language daily stating that CPL players will be making a fraction of USL players' salaries. Think that pretty much confirms the 500k thing now when taken together with all the other sources.

It does not confirm it. The $500K figure is wrong. Period. Everything that the league has said (salaries averaging $40K), everything that’s been ‘leaked’ (except for that one suggestion of $500K), and everything I’ve been told privately (more significant than both these things) disputes this. 

And dare I say it, once again you are cherry-picking things to suit your narrative.

[Ansem]

9 hours ago, shamrock said:

I think (purely speculating here) the league overplayed it's hand in trying to forcing Ottawa to disperse it's players to other members. Let them have the upper hand in season 1. But now Fury shouldn't be talking about what's good for Canadian soccer 'cause obviously they don't care. 

As for the salary cap, I've said from day one 1,5 million wasn't realistic. 

The league did what the NHL did to WHA clubs. I don't think they overplayed their hand.

Parity is praised in MLS, I don't see why CPL cant be held to the same standards 

[Ansem]

7 hours ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said:

We now have a mainstream media sports journalist from the Ottawa region's French language daily stating that CPL players will be making a fraction of USL players' salaries. Think that pretty much confirms the 500k thing now when taken together with all the other sources.

Fury Fanatic is hardly a solid source, he's quotting an unknown source that no one know. His aggressive language against CPL makes me doubt he speaks for the Fury. That would be a poor way to ensure acceptance into the league at a later time.

Nor this journalist that mainly covers hockey and then adds to his profil....Fury too

Edited September 6, 2018 by Ansem

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

They are almost certainly being told this stuff by the Fury front office and are being used to divulge the information the Fury front office want to get out to their fans but can't provide directly as they have to do the whole we support the league 100% and will watch carefully what happens next season as we may join later spiel.

Edited September 6, 2018 by BringBackTheBlizzard

[MtlMario]

Alex Bunbury was on TSN690 radio (The Montreal Forum w/ Tony Marinaro) this morning talking about the tryouts and the CPL in general. Interesting listen. Should be on their web site tomorrow I would guess.

Edited September 7, 2018 by MtlMario

[Complete Homer]

I suspect that each source - blogger and mainstream media alike - are each getting one since of the story.

If the Fury's narrative is that the wage bill was too low to keep the team together, and the league's narrative is that Ottawa refused to have concessions around player dispersal, the truth is probably somewhere in the middle.

Regardless, it's extremely disappointing that it seemed to turn into a game of chicken instead of finding what was needed to be done to unite the pyramid. Personally I would have had no problem with Ottawa's contracts being grandfathered in, though I accept that there's probably more to the story

2 hours ago, rob.notenboom said:

It does not confirm it. The $500K figure is wrong. Period. Everything that the league has said (salaries averaging $40K), everything that’s been ‘leaked’ (except for that one suggestion of $500K), and everything I’ve been told privately (more significant than both these things) disputes this. 

And dare I say it, once again you are cherry-picking things to suit your narrative.

Where did the 500k figure even come from?

Regardless, I find it unlikely that Ottawa's salary budget would really be so far above CPL. Everything published from actual journalists on the matter - including The Athletic a couple weeks ago - says that top USL players make less 40k USD and squad players aren't paid anything. Even at the sub-1 million figure that was bandied about by the Pacific FC owner would be a big improvement on the USL salaries as per The Athletic

Only way that FuryFanatic's statements make any sense in the face of all published information is that CPL wants to count the full salary of a player on loan from MLS against the cap, even if the CPL team isn't the one paying it.

Creapeau, Reid, guys earning close to 100k from their MLS squad are key players that Ottawa is obviously not actually paying for, but represent higher end salaries that would be very difficult to fit in an 800k-1 million cap. I could believe that that scenario legitimately divisive among potential owners, as the worry would be that CPL would just become a competition of who could grab the most MLS loans if they were free against the cap, but Ottawa obviously feels entitled to not decimate their own roster

Edited September 6, 2018 by Complete Homer

[deschamp86]

1 hour ago, Ansem said:

Fury Fanatic is hardly a solid source, he's quotting an unknown source that no one know. His aggressive language against CPL makes me doubt he speaks for the Fury.

Not to mention that he has flip flopped a number of times. It seems like he posts everything he hears in hopes of getting a couple things right here and there

[Ansem]

1 hour ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said:

They are almost certainly being told this stuff by the Fury front office and are being used to divulge the information the Fury front office want to get out to their fans but can't provide directly as they have to do the whole we support the league 100% and will watch carefully what happens next season as we may join later spiel.

That's a terrible way to do business if the Fury front office use them to get the message out there. At the end of the day, CPL owners have to agree to the Fury joining the league.

Not helpful in damaging their relationship this early on by unleashing the "Fury Fanatic" on social media. Shit like this would never fly with the NHL and other leagues, it shouldn't with CPL.

Both sides can disagree and keep talking. Fine if the Fury issued an official statement, which they did. But that Fury bots that were unleashed on social media did WAY more harm than good. Can't see CPL owners liking this one bit, nor should they.

Fury shouldn't overplay their hand here.

[Admin]

1 hour ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said:

They are almost certainly being told this stuff by the Fury front office and are being used to divulge the information the Fury front office want to get out to their fans but can't provide directly as they have to do the whole we support the league 100% and will watch carefully what happens next season as we may join later spiel.

This seems likely to me too.

This is likely using people as the pubic arm of a negotiation. 

Might be a little hard on some to walk some of this stuff back. 

Or they played chicken with the deadline and lost.

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

Think the Fury are being genuine about possibly joining later for 2020 and beyond so there is scope for ongoing contact, but think 2019 isn't happening now because the issues being described in the stream of tweets from Ottawa are probably not resolvable in the short term. One good thing about scaling back the scale of operations a bit is that it usually increases the number of possible markets and owners, so CanPL can probably better afford to lose the Fury at least for now than to accommodate them as that may have negative repercussions elsewhere.

[BradMack]

I've been thinking about this a lot, the whole image te league is putting out, the amount of hires they've made for the media side of things, the amount of $$ the owners have, the success of the membersip drives.... This whole thing about drastically low player salaries isn't matching up. I just don't think tey'd be dumb enough to do this.

[Complete Homer]

42 minutes ago, BradMack said:

I've been thinking about this a lot, the whole image te league is putting out, the amount of hires they've made for the media side of things, the amount of $$ the owners have, the success of the membersip drives.... This whole thing about drastically low player salaries isn't matching up. I just don't think tey'd be dumb enough to do this.

This is a solid point

But also worth noting that while some clubs (Forge) are hiring left and right, some like York 9 only have a handful of employees. Might indicate a bit of separation on the willingness of some to spend

Which, in my opinion, is why a soft cap with a luxury tax up to a hard cap makes so much sense. Let the richer owners support the smaller ones in the act of boosting their roster (to a point, I don't want to see large disparities)