Average pay of about $150K is really not much for a professional sports player. Especially when the average career is, I'm guessing, probably 10 years or less. After that, these guys have to start over at some other career. Sounds like they may have a good reason to strike.

Some of them can make better money in other parts of the world.

There's an interesting article about MLS labor negotiations on the website for SoccerAmerica, which points out that players can actually earn more money in Scandinavia than MLS. So, where's the incentive for any talented player to stick around in the U.S.?

Today over 18,000 showed up for the Timbers/Sounders preseason game which was not included in the Sounders season ticket holder package.

Would be a shame and a terribly bad business decision if they scrap the league to avoid giving rights to MLS players that belong to every other FIFA-sanctioned professional in the world.

But it could work out well if the Timbers end up in a league where the team owns player contracts and they can earn some coin from finding local prospects. I know this: better to be Portland than Philly.

Average pay of about $150K is really not much for a professional sports player.

Well, when the median income in the US is around $48k, its kinda hard to feel sorry for them.

Since our agreements with young Paulson already call for pushing down wages and working conditions for every other worker in the stadium, why should players be special? The fact that our tax dollars will be supplementing Paulson employee wages to get them from up from immoral to merely shameful is the ugliest pox on this whole stinking deal.

The Seattle PI article said:

"The preseason match was not part of the season-ticket package, but a good crowd showed up on a rainy night at Qwest, including an end-zone contingent of about 700 flag-wavers from Portland who thoroughly enjoyed the outcome."

If the game had been held in Portland at PGE Park, one wonders what the attendance would have been.

There would have been a ton of people there. As long as there's a league, soccer will do well in Portland. But these leagues come and go, and it's a heck of a program to bank serious tax money on.

The success of MLS - such as it is - has been built on a union contract from hell. Read the details online if you really want to know. They are ridiculous.
So the MLS has made it this far partly because the players are in such an unfair position as far as movement and guarantees. Incidentally, that average income sounds great 'til you read about some players making 30 grand.
Several things could happen:
1. They settle for a one year "recession contract" and it all blows up again right before the Timbers first MLS season.
2. The players give in and the league slowly loses ground when the good players decline playing here.
3. The league gives in and suddenly the player-hating business model is out, exposing MLS's true economic weakness.
One sentence in the article I read said that the guarantees that MLS offers players, aren't really guarantees at all.
What do you bet we run into that same phenomenon with the Paulsons if these multifaceted PGE schemes blow up on us?
Finally, I was also a little surprised that Seattle lost at home to the Timbers tonight. Last year, all we heard was how terrific the Sounders were and how much better the new league is.
I know we have some new players, but was that really enough to launch us into the rarified air where the Gods of MLS rule the earth?
Or was that part just more B.S.?

I don't see where the owners are going to give anything on this. Right now, outside of franchise fees, MLS is bleeding money.

I support bringing MLS to Portland, but this is looking like it could be an epic disaster on the same level as the South Waterfront Development and the Tram.

Jack, should have an "I Was Right" blog-post, listing all the issues on which he was correct and the city was wrong.

The MLS business model, now 15 years old, was designed to prevent what happened with the old North American Soccer League. Two things killed that league. First, they overexpaneded recklessly, going from 9 teams in 1973 to 24 teams in 1978.

At the same time, the New York Cosmos started bringing in aging, formerly world-class players and paid them world-class money. That killed the league's competitive balance: As with major league baseball today, only about four teams had any hope of winning. It also meant that for most of the teams in the league, it was a one-game season. They'd get a good crowd once each year when the Cosmos came to town.

To MLS' credit, they learned from that.

MLS has also been quite successful at developing American players. American players now have options to go to Europe that didn't exist 20 years ago.

The league's player-development side has grown faster than the revenue side. Balancing all that isn't going to be easy.

Explaining why the last big soccer league failed here in America is a debatable way to make your case.
If you're selling a war in Afghanistan, do you really go over why the Soviets failed?
Sorry, that's not a fair analogy. Americans support the war in Afghanistan, much more than they do soccer.

Jack, should have an "I Was Right" blog-post, listing all the issues on which he was correct and the city was wrong.

Not sure that's possible. There isn't that much room available in cyberspace.

"The preseason match was not part of the season-ticket package, but a good crowd showed up on a rainy night at Qwest, including an end-zone contingent of about 700 flag-wavers from Portland who thoroughly enjoyed the outcome."

'If the game had been held in Portland at PGE Park, one wonders what the attendance would have been.' Answer - about the same 700.

Okay, so I seriously realize that it might have been 1400; but seriously - I HATE SOCCER; watching paint dry is more interesting to me. So if the whole thing goes belly up, wouldn't hurt my feelings one bit.

Your mileage may differ.

If you're selling a war in Afghanistan, do you really go over why the Soviets failed?

So your approach to Afghanistan would be to replicate what worked so well in Vietnam?

I know ... Haters gotta hate.

My approach to PGE Park would be to leave well enough alone instead of losing a place to play baseball. I know, I know. MLS demanded it. Except for the stuff they relented on.
And anything to please the Paulsons, a family that helped bring on the current economic disaster that makes shoveling them more money seem so dumb.
I know....Vampire Squid have to eat too.
By the way, Roger, what about that game last night? Are we that good or is MLS that bad?

As an "out of towner"my opinion is that most of America sees soccer as glorified "kick ball", so far down on the food chain of sports/entertainment that most could care less if there was a strike or not. Is it really wise to go on strike against an organization that loses money??

How about this, Trish:
Is it really smart to spend any extra money on a league that is still proving itself?
I saw Pele play in Civic Stadium - now PGE Park. That was one failed remodel ago.
We have had a dual-use stadium for decades and it has worked fine.
Do we really need to evict the baseball team so that Henry Paulson's kid can have a soccer-only playpen? With all the usual Gee-Whiz B.S. like a sports clinic built in?
Aren't we actually helping make soccer more viable in America by not throwing any money around?

Have you followed the situation in Greece? I bet not many Americans know that Greece has been been brought to the point of riots and economic unrest because of debt problems from dealing with...wait for it.... Goldman Sachs.
What makes you think Henry Paulson - who got the TARP money and immediately changed what it was intended for - is going to smile on the Rose City when he helped cause our economic meltdown as head of Goldman Sachs?

Then you have Roger here - a loyal member of the Timbers Army - who should be on the Timbers payroll, by the way, for his endless efforts to sell this thing.
Anyway, he tries to portray me as anti-soccer when I've been to lots of soccer games at the same park. I even saw the Sounders play the Cosmos in Pele's last competitive game which was at what is now PGE Park.
The Timbers Army have their scarves on too tightly and the blood is not flowing through their brains. This is an anti-Paulsons thing. Henry Paulson. Goldman Sachs.
Based on South Waterfront and a bunch of projects, I am fairly confident that we are in the process of being fleeced here. I'm not impressed with the MLS argument that they have to spend a lot of money when they are not doing that well. That is exactly what sank the last league.
Wouldn't it be classic if we end up with a bunch of debt, no baseball team, no soccer team, and a bunch of guys in scarves wandering around town talking about how they should have listened to reason?

Yes, these leagues come and go. The AFL, the ABA, NHA... heck even baseball had it's growing pains with the NABBP in the 1800s.

Major League Soccer: BWAHAHAHAHAHAH!! It will fold within 36 months.