MLS and American playoff systems in general are not bad. From an interest standpoint, they simply move some end-of-season drama from the bottom of the table to the middle. I am glad they’re not the only model, though. Variety is the spice of life.
Closed-shop American leagues also make a debatable but not insane tradeoff of fewer fans getting top-flight sport in their towns, but more fans getting a legitimate bite at the apple for a championship.
The American system may not be terrible from a sporting perspective, but the politics is awful. Top-flight teams can be run poorly for years with basically no consequences, and if your team is uncompetitive then the fans just have to deal with that until your team fixes itself. In a pyramid system, your team at least drops to a tier where it will be competitive again.
Well, I did it again. I clicked the “show in context” icon on Alexendrite instead of the identical one to add a link and nuked my comment. :-)
Summing it up:
Those poorly managed franchises occupy a cultural space in North America not unlike “sleeping giant” clubs in Europe, and the financial and other parity measures are designed to encourage fans to hope every year. Sometimes it even works.
The systems are different, largely arising out of differences between America in 1885 and England in 1885, but both have more than a century of passionate fan support and I find both compelling.
MLS is a weird hybrid, being both the perfection of the closed shop model, yet also participating in the global market for both aging stars and younger players of decent but fungible quality.
MLS and American playoff systems in general are not bad. From an interest standpoint, they simply move some end-of-season drama from the bottom of the table to the middle. I am glad they’re not the only model, though. Variety is the spice of life.
Closed-shop American leagues also make a debatable but not insane tradeoff of fewer fans getting top-flight sport in their towns, but more fans getting a legitimate bite at the apple for a championship.
The American system may not be terrible from a sporting perspective, but the politics is awful. Top-flight teams can be run poorly for years with basically no consequences, and if your team is uncompetitive then the fans just have to deal with that until your team fixes itself. In a pyramid system, your team at least drops to a tier where it will be competitive again.
Well, I did it again. I clicked the “show in context” icon on Alexendrite instead of the identical one to add a link and nuked my comment. :-)
Summing it up: