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November 17, 2007
News bonanza from Garber address, MLS meetings
With MLS Cup weekend in full swing, there's a ton of news coming out of DC as league Commissioner Don Garber gives his state of the league address and the Board of Governors gets together. Here are a few highlights:
- The plausibility of the "Landon Donovan to San Jose" rumors took another hit yesterday with Grant Wahl's report for Sports Illustrated that Donovan, Eddie Johnson, and Carlos Ruiz will not be subject to the Designated Player rule for 2008. The trio each make more than the $400,000 limit specified by that rule, but the league allowed them to be grandfathered in when the new guideline was introduced in 2007 because they signed their hefty contracts before the rule existed. The move is largely seen as a concession to the L.A. Galaxy and their owners, AEG, who have benefitted the league significantly this year through the acquisition of David Beckham. Had this ruling gone the other way, the Galaxy would have been forced to either acquire a second DP slot or to trade Donovan.
- MLSnet.com has a story on Garber's State of the League address, which included a detailed update on the cities currently vying for an expansion team. The current list includes Atlanta (with Falcons owner Arthur Blank), Las Vegas, Miami, Montreal, New York (with the owners of the Mets), Philadelphia, Portland, St. Louis, and Vancouver. Either Philadelphia or St. Louis is the favorite to join Seattle as a 2009 expansion team.
- Also coming out of the DC meetings is this report by the Boston Globe's Frank Dell'Apa that MLS TV ratings increased by 25 percent this year. The commissioner is also featured in this lengthy Q and A with Jack Bell of the New York Times. (A shorter version of the story runs in the Times' business section today.
- Speaking of business, BusinessWeek magazine takes a look at the league's growing Hispanic audience in a story headlined, "The Great Blanco Hope." The story also talks about Univision's success with Superliga broadcasts, which "averaged 637,000 households during the tournament, compared with 435,000 households for top Mexican League matches."
- Even with MLS Cup on TV tomorrow to entertain us, we're really more focused on next week. The list of protected players goes out on Tuesday and the expansion draft, where the Quakes will get to choose an unprotected player from 11 MLS teams, takes place Wednesday. Judging from the wheeling and dealing that took place in connection with last year's expansion draft, it's going to be a wild ride. We can hardly wait.
Posted by Jay at November 17, 2007 10:16 AM