MLS in Atlanta? Are You Kidding?

by Chris Allen

March 2000

Copyright © 2000

Michael Lewis,  MLS has fresh faces, different alignment, high hopes 

I've lived in northeast Georgia for 14 years -- and still spend part of each year in New England -- so perhaps it would be good to have a little perspective on this.

Before people get too excited about Atlanta as an MLS city, let's step back and take a look at the pros and cons:

Pros:

•  Huge youth and amateur soccer community
•  Rapidly growing latino (mostly Mexican) community
•  Rapid population and economic growth rate
•  Almost year round capacity to play outdoors

•  For all of the pro team sports since 1965, this place has to be one of the biggest front-running cities I've ever seen. When teams start to do well (Braves in early 90s, Hawks in late 80s, Falcons 2 years ago) people come out of the woodwork like they are giving away free money at the stadia. But when teams start to do poorly, thousands come to games cleverly disguised as empty seats. Fickle doesn't even begin to describe the pro sports "fans" here.
  
  
•  Despite all the protestations, this is still an auto racing and college sports town. Very simply, pro sports have not been here long enough to establish the kind of really committed roots that pro sports fans develop in Boston, New York, Philly, Detroit, DC, Chicago, and a few other large cities with pro sports traditions that date back over a century.
  
  
•  We've all heard from the days of the NASL that the youth soccer means that soccer is the sport of the future. The "future" is now, people. Until we can turn these kids and their parents into pro socccer FANS who come to games, we have a problem.
  
  
•  If the experience in other US cities which rapidly growing latino populations is similar, there will have to be high quality soccer with at least a few recognizable quality latinos on the team, or these fans will keep watching their local amateur leagues, and televised games on Univision, Telemundo, and Galavision.
  
  
•  If past support for minor league pro soccer is essential for MLS expansion -- and I think it ought to be criterion #1 -- then Atlanta fails miserably. There have been so many owners of A-League and USL teams in Atlanta since the early 90s that my head spins even trying to keep track of the personnel. Too many incompetent -- if not actually criminal -- activities have been done in the name of pro soccer in Atlanta in the last decade to sour even the most diehard pro soccer fan. Until the A-League Silverbacks are consistently averaging 7,000-8,000 fans a game, putting an MLS team in Atlanta is sheer insanity.
  
  
• Atlanta Soccer "Village"? Only in Atlanta would the people leading the charge for a physical presence entitle something as a "village" when they are nowhere near to selecting a physical location. People, "village" is a physical entity not a virtual one. And if you check out their website Atlanta Soccer Village you'll see that the thing hasn't been updated in months. Talk to me when the shovel hits the dirt.

Bottom line, if MLS is looking for expansion sites, don't come here now. All you'll get is another Miami or at best another Tampa Bay. Before anybody even thinks seriously of coming to Atlanta, there better be teams in Houston, Philly, Detroit, Portland, Seattle, San Diego and Rochester.