Another WPS team in trouble...

http://theoriginalwinger.com/2010-12-13-chicago-red-stars-suspend-season-due-to-lack-of-investors

Not good. Hopefully they can pull it together, one of our favorite players might be without a team!

I'm guessing Megan will be picked up by another team. Kelsey is a question mark. From a cursory glance, there are four national team goalkeepers (US and Canada) that are free agents--Hope Solo, Nicole Barnhart, Jill Loyden & Karina LaBlanc. Solo may be signed by Atlanta again, and the other 3 will likely be signed somewhere. But with 6 teams in the league, a couple of decent college gks potentially coming into the league, Kristen Arnold and the Notre Dame gk and Kelsey coming off of an injury... Good karma for both of them and hope the WPS finds a recipe for success.

It's starting to look like the WPS is not going to be a place to develop players in the long run. -too volatile.

Perhaps the old path of playing on more stable clubs in Japan and Europe will be many player's best hope.

Yeah, without a stable parent organization it's hard to see the WPS surviving, especially with the economic side as it is...

Purplegeezer wrote:It's starting to look like the WPS is not going to be a place to develop players in the long run. -too volatile.

Perhaps the old path of playing on more stable clubs in Japan and Europe will be many player's best hope.

Same issue on the men's side. Every offseason you can bet on some second division clubs folding or moving because none of them have any money.

The WPS business strategy/financial plan is a bit of a headscratcher to me. They went into major markets in hopes of getting fans with if I remember correctly a goal of 5,000 fans attending games on average. I think they averaged closer to 4k per team. Their model was pretty low salaries for players not on the national team or named Marta (~$30-35,000). With 20-25 players on the team including development players, Im guessing their payroll for players were in the $750K -$1M range. Not sure what ticket prices were, but it's probably in the $8-12 range. Based on a 20 game season, even if they hit their 5K fan goal, that's $800-1.2M. I suppose there are additional revenue sources, but there are also additional expenses for stadiums, travel, office staff, etc. With them now having 6 teams on the east coast with Atlanta or Western NY being the farthest west, I'm not sure how successful they will be attracting fans outside of those markets. But, I'm sure it is run by people smarter than I.

keeper wrote:The WPS business strategy/financial plan is a bit of a headscratcher to me. They went into major markets in hopes of getting fans with if I remember correctly a goal of 5,000 fans attending games on average. I think they averaged closer to 4k per team. Their model was pretty low salaries for players not on the national team or named Marta (~$30-35,000). With 20-25 players on the team including development players, Im guessing their payroll for players were in the $750K -$1M range. Not sure what ticket prices were, but it's probably in the $8-12 range. Based on a 20 game season, even if they hit their 5K fan goal, that's $800-1.2M. I suppose there are additional revenue sources, but there are also additional expenses for stadiums, travel, office staff, etc. With them now having 6 teams on the east coast with Atlanta or Western NY being the farthest west, I'm not sure how successful they will be attracting fans outside of those markets. But, I'm sure it is run by people smarter than I.

well, I think the model did have sposorship and a little TV money in it as well, but yeah, it's hard to see how they could make it work.Throw in 400K for a Marta, and the whole model falls apart.
I've always thought they should have tried to build on the ready made market of watching your favorite college players in their continuing careers.
But the best model in the country for that, (Portland, didn't have anybody to foot the startup money.
Imagine how many of us would have gone to see a eam with all the stars from the NW (not just UP) each week.

Christine and Tiff in goal, Tina Ellertson, Lisa Sari and Hope Solo on the defense, Frenchie and Rachel roaming the sidelines....

Long term for both men and women, I think Sepp might be right on relegation. Survival of the fittest is where its at, and et the chips fall where they may. a couple of idiots with some money shouldn't be able to decide the fate of soccer in this country.


And maybe it's time to start syncing the soccer schedules in the USA (including College) to the rest of the world.

Yeah, for me it was hard not be skeptical of the WPS model from the start. The ticket prices are dirt cheap, and some of the salaries seem a bit on the high side in comparison. The sponsorship isn't as good as it is in the MLS, and the women's game is at a disadvantage because you can't have a friendly against a big name club in the same way as you can in the men's game (like a pre-season match up against Manchester United or Barcelona). The closest they can come to that is maybe putting a local club against the US women's national team.