Memo to the MLS Competition Committee

by Chris Allen

August 1999

1. An economic argument to eliminate the shootout in favor of allowing draws to remain at the end of 90 minutes, as they do in virtually all other professional leagues around the world, and the adoption of a 3/1/0 (W/D/L) scoring system
2. Allowing the referee to control the clock on the field, as referees do in all other countries where soccer is played, and the adoption of the traditional "count-up" clock to 45 minutes per half, rather than the American style "count-down" clock, so common in other North American sports.
3. A fundamental restructuring of the "best of 3" playoff system, to a two-leg, total goals format, basically following the pattern of the Mexican league playoffs.

 Advocates for eliminating the shootout have made dozens of compelling arguments for removing this pantomime, this stain on the sport of soccer. I'm not going to repeat any of them here but I'm going to try another tack and speak to the Competition Committee in a language they will understand, the language of money!.

Shootouts cost MLS money and reduce advertising revenue!

Every game that goes to the shootout costs MLS money. How? If you don't have shootouts and the games end after 90 minutes you will ALWAYS  finish the games in less than 2 hours, AND there will be more time to run more commercials in all of those games that  currently end in shootouts. MLS contracts with its TV partners for two hour blocks of time to show the games. This is actually a competitive advantage that MLS should play up when comparing itself to other sports. The two hour time frame allows for a 90 minute game, 15 minutes of half-time, and pre- and post-game discussion. The 30 minutes of non playing time offer plenty of opportunity to insert commercials and help provide the revenue that MLS so desperately needs.

However, every game that goes to the shootout kills at least 8 minutes of  TV commercial time and prevents MLS sponsors from having their products shown. They are not getting what they contracted for and they are not getting their products shown. Furthermore, no MLS game that has gone to a shootout has EVER finished in less than two hours, leading to another problem with economic consequences: Shootout games run over the two hour block of time and cut into whatever programming follows. I can't imagine that on games broadcast by ABC, ESPN, or Univision that this over-run does not have economic consequences. Quite likely MLS receives less revenue from its broadcast partners because these networks are not showing scheduled programming when MLS games run over the two hour block.

Come on MLS, kill the shootout and, for once, play the game like it is everywhere else. You will save money!

2. Clocks and Micro-Managment.

Now that the FIFA standard of running time clocks counting up with the 4th official holding up a sign indicating  in WHOLE MINUTES how much time added on there will be is established in all major leagues around the world, why not in MLS too? MLS teams play under these conditions in the US Open Cup, in CONCACAF club matches, and in the InterAmerican Cup. Our national team plays under this format for World Cup qualifiers and in the World Cup. Would it really be so "alien" if we used the world standard in MLS too?

There are 3 problems with the current MLS "count-down" clock:

1. We have not yet arrived at a level of technological or human competence to make this work smoothly and consistently.
2. More seriously, once a referee has stopped the clock for semi consequential stoppage "A" in the 10th minute, it makes it much harder for the ref to stop it in the 35th minute for more consequential stoppage "B".
3. Some fans might then howl that a stoppage is a stoppage and we need to know precisely how much time is left. No We Don't! In gridiron football, basketball and hockey the ball/puck is either "in play" or "out of play" and everyone can see when this is. When it's in, the clock runs, when it isn't, the clock doesn't. Soccer is not a sport where this level of micro-mangement is possible. Here are several examples where it might or might not be feasible to stop the clock:

• after goal scored
• setting up a wall
• minor injury
• more than 10 seconds on a throw in
• setting up a corner kick
• arguing with the referee
• substitution

Who knows? And if we did, do we really need to codify this?

The solution to this is the word "Judgment", namely the referee's ability to take the entire half into account as it is being played and -- after 45 minutes of running time have been completed -- decide whether to add on time to compensate for various forms of time wasting.

The timing of the sport of soccer is inherently imprecise and is not subject to micro management. In short, it's different from other North American sports in the structure of play itself. This is one of soccer's unique qualities, so why confuse American fans who see soccer timed by one way in all other matches on TV, and another way in MLS?

3. Playoffs: 2 Legs, not "Best of 3".

The "best of 3" system really needs to go. Just because the "best-of-an-odd-number-of-games" is used in baseball, basketball and hockey does not mean it works for soccer. There were numerous problems with this format from the outset in 1996:

• Unequal amounts of rest for teams with the "extra" game;
• Problems in clearing TV time for the "if necessary" game;
• Uncertainty of scheduling the "if necessary" match;
• The inequity of treating shootout "wins" as normal time wins", and having a both a different scoring system in the playoffs than for the regular season, and the ugly possibility that a team with two shootout "wins" would defeat the team that won the other game in 90 minutes;
• The dead time if all series end in 2 games;
• The increased number of midweek playoff games which produce smaller crowds; and lower TV ratings;
• Stadium and TV conflicts with baseball, football, and hockey in October, one of the busiest sports months of the year

What is exactly the problem with the 2 leg, home and away format?

In my view it is the best way to avoid the defensive and physical, soccer that we have witnessed in the MLS Playoffs during the last three years. The major problem for the league in the playoffs is that the insistence of the "best of 3" series means that ONLY WINS ARE IMPORTANT AND THE ACTUAL SCORING OF GOALS IS NOT!

This is all the more ironic since for 25 years US Soccer officials have relentlessly come up with the most arcane, convoluted scoring systems to produce goal scoring. Yet in the playoffs, they do a 180, completely disregard the importance of goals and don't even realize how they have altered the outcomes.

The playoffs are supposed to be a league's showcase event, and yet the foolish attempt to have a "winner" every game and the insistence on having a best of 3 series meant that the league has devalued the scoring of actual goals to irrelevance during the playoffs.

If MLS really wants to run the playoffs to produce exciting soccer in which goals are still important, just look at the Mexican playoffs where many MLS fans will have seen this on US TV. The way the Mexican league does it is that the first game as at the home of the LOWER seeded team, the second is at the home of the higher seeded one. But what if both teams have an equal number of goals after two legs? Mexico has elegantly solved this problem and made the regular season more meaningful. Any 2 leg series where both teams have the same number of goals goes to the team with the best regular season record (which is also the team that plays the second game at home).

So why not introduce this into MLS? If draws are allowed to stand during the regular season, this two-leg playoff system makes even more sense.

Come on MLS Competition Committee! Let's play the game like it is everywhere else in the world for once! Please?