Rogers/Bell: Thinking About Afterthoughts

With all the oxygen in the Toronto sports conversation being taken up by upcoming changes in the world of our benevolent corporate overlords I thought I’d chip in with a typical bit of contrarianism.  In the TFC corner of this discussion, beyond trying to parse out what all this means for TFC’s chances of winning in the immediate future, a not insignificant part of the conversation has centred on the unexamined assumption that TFC isn’t really an important part of the deal.  I can’t say with confidence that such an assumption is incorrect, at least in terms of the valuation of MLSE the deal implies, but there’s something that needs to be challenged:

The "afterthought" narrative is being overstated.

A Point of Nomenclature

Writing yesterday at Canadian Soccer News about the respective likelihood of Toronto FC re-signing Joao Plata and Richard Eckersley blogger Duane Rollins made mention of his understanding that

 

The problem is that TFC is very tight up against the cap... ...the Reds only have about $500,000 available to them.

 

A number of commenters have already asked, not unreasonably, for clarification on how he came up with that number and how exactly MLS’ “salary cap” works.

Meanwhile, over on the Red Patch Boys forum there’s a stickied thread that attempts to calculate a “Cap Space Estimate” based on available data provided by the MLS Players Union compared to what the estimated minimum “salary cap” will be according to the current collective bargaining agreement between the league and its players.

It may seem like a pedantic point of nomenclature but continued use of the phrases “salary cap” and “cap space” are anachronisms that probably confuse more than they clarify when it comes to understanding how an MLS roster is paid for and organized.  The reason?  Simply put:

 

Since 2007 MLS has effectively not had a salary cap.

 

The Most Horrible Thing Ever

The following was originally a (typically longwinded) reply on the Voyageur's forum.  I repost here because I think it's something that TFC supporters need to take note of and in some ways its exactly the sort of writing I've always done that was probably more appropriate for a blog:


We're months from the start of the season, there's a lot of time for both teams to change and take shape, TFC is looking better at this point in the off season than they ever have before,* and I hate making explicit predictions but, honestly, from what I've seen from Jesse Marsch Toronto FC fans need to start preparing themselves for something that most can't even imagine: a Montreal team that is competitive in their very first season, capable of finishing ahead of TFC, and possibly even making the playoffs.

Great Expectations

The expectation around much of the rest of Canada, maybe even among Montreal supporters, is probably that the new 2012 Montreal Impact will be terrible simply because they’re an expansion team.  Toronto and Vancouver being the two worst expansion teams since Chivas and RSL stank it up in 2005 probably deforms the expectations of a great number of Canadian soccer fans.

But expansion teams don't have to be terrible.