Major League Soccer's Seattle Sounders FC ownership puts its money where its mouth is

From their inception and through their pre-operating period, opening season and well into their sophomore season in Major League Soccer, the Seattle Sounders FC have defined themselves as something special in North American professional sport.

Exhibit 1 is how they created an ownership group which blended the new (Hollywood producer Joe Roth, comedian and television star Drew Carey and former software mogul and financial titan Paul Allen) with the old (Adrian Hanauer, owner and operator of the incumbent USL Sounders). It gave the franchise seamless continuity with the city's USL soccer tradition and history while at the same time injecting it with economic, political and creative clout that is second to none in Major League Soccer.

Exhibit 2 is how they listened and responded to their constituents on the issue of the name and identity of the franchise. They abandoned their choice for a new name -- either Seattle FC, Seattle Alliance or Seattle Republic -- and embraced the clear favourite of Seattle soccer fans: the traditional Sounders FC designation.

Exhibit 3 is the democratic spin they've put on soccer operations management; a vehicle in which Sounders FC season ticket holders will have a voice in extending the initial contract of general manager Hanauer...or in voting for change.

Exhibit 4 is the authenticity of their fan experience; where Sounders shirts and scarves combine with band-led fan marches (Sound Wave) and other touches on match nights at Qwest Field to make it the closest thing to European soccer in North America.

Exhibit 5 is the most impressive marketing launch in North American expansion franchise history.

Exhibit 6 is an infrastructure provided by Allen's Vulcan Sports & Entertainment, the company which owns and operates the Seattle Seahawks of the NFL and markets and manages the Sounders FC.

Exhibit 7 is a dynamic community partnership between the Sounders FC and Washington State Youth Soccer.

The first-year results included a playoff berth as an expansion franchise and records in MLS attendance (north of 30,000 per game), sponsorship (including a five-year, $20 million shirt deal with Microsoft's Xbox 360), merchandising and regional television success. The second-year has picked up where the first ended, with crowds now eclipsing the 36,000-mark in an expanded seating manifest at Qwest Field.

Yet the ownership and management of the Seattle soccer club pushed the envelope to another level this week after the Sounders suffered an embarrassing 4-0 loss at home at the hands of the Los Angeles Galaxy. By Sunday morning, they had announced a one-game refund for all season ticket holders. It will come in the form of a credit against next year's season ticket charges.

It all came after one of the partners in the club looked around at his colleagues in the owners' suite and said if he was a fan, he'd want his money back.

Within 24 hours, Sounders FC season ticket holders had received word they would get the single-game credit as an acknowledgment of the sub-par team performance against the Galaxy and in appreciation of the support they had given the club since the announcement four years ago that MLS was coming to Seattle.

It was another example of the Sounders FC walking the walk and talking the talk. It was also quite simply a case of the team's ownership putting its money where its mouth is. Whether or not other ownership groups have the integrity to make similar moves in the months and years to come, the Sounders FC have made a resounding statement about the importance of season ticket holders to the most successful sport franchises.

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Legacy of 2006 FIFA World Cup powers Bayern Munich and entire German Bundesliga

On the field, Bayern Munich is basking in the spotlight of the UEFA Champions League. The most famous German soccer club has revelled in the world's biggest annual sports tournament, has reached the 2010 final May 22nd in Madrid and will square off against Internazionale Milan before the largest single-day sports television audience on the planet.

The re-emergence of Bayern Munich among the world's soccer club elite is part of a bigger story. It is a metaphor for the rise of the German Bundesliga it has represented so well in this year's UEFA Champions League.

Off the field, Bayern Munich leads the German Bundesliga in merchandise sales and team sponsorship -- powered largely by its T-Mobile shirt deal. It is second only to Borussia Dortmund in Bundesliga attendance, with crowds of more than 69,000 the norm at Allianz Arena in Munich.

With a league title in sight with the 36th and final round of Bundesliga play this weekend, Bayern Munich appears ready to regain the status it held in the 1970s, both on and off the field.

Yet it does so as part of a Bundesliga that is itself having a banner year. The German Bundesliga is now the number one European league in three of the most important categories of sport business: attendance, merchandising and jersey sponsorship sales.

Driven by a league-wide commitment to family ticket pricing, Bundesliga clubs are averaging around 42,000 fans per game. Powered by lucrative deals in the betting and energy sectors in Germany, Bundesliga shirt sponsorships this year rose by five per cent to a league-wide average of $10 million US (about $2.5 million US per club ahead of the Barclays English Premier League). Merchandise sales have never been stronger.

It is no coincidence to me that the Bundesliga has gained strength each and every year since Germany hosted the 2006 FIFA World Cup. In fact, the growing strength of the league is a direct legacy of that World Cup.

One only has to look at the spike in attendance at World Cup host cities such as Munich, Dortmund, Gelsenkirchen (site of the Veltins Arena that is home of Schalke), Hamburg, Frankfurt, Cologne and Stuttgart over the past five seasons to recognize the impact of 2006. http://www.thesportmarket.biz/podium_news2.htm

It all begins with the new stadiums and stadium renovations that were completed for the World Cup, upgrading the spectator venues in almost half of the Bundesliga's 18 markets. The honeymoon period for those new stadia and renos is still going strong. Yet the resurgence is also reflected in media, television, corporate and fan interest, fueled in large part by the third-place berth of the German national team that year and the first-hand exposure German fans had to the world's best players, more of whom are now playing in the Bundesliga.

Call it the World Cup lift. Four years later, it's still raising the bar for Bayern Munich in particular and the German Bundesliga in general. In some respects, it's shades of the last time the Bundesliga ruled Europe on the strength of Bayern's mid-1970s dynasty. That European champion did its best work in the years after the Munich 1972 Olympics and the 1974 World Cup, which Germany also hosted...and won.

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It's official: Vancouver for Memphis is worst trade in National Basketball Association history

There have been some lopsided trades in the history of the National Basketball Association.

Among the worst trades ever was the 1980 transaction which sent Robert Parrish and the #3 draft pick who wound up being Kevin McHale to the Boston Celtics for the two Golden State Warrior draft picks who became Joe Barry Carroll and Ricky Brown. Also popping to mind are draft day deals sending Kobe Bryant from Charlotte to the Los Angeles Lakers for Vlade Divac in 1996 and Dirk Nowitzki from Milwaukee to Dallas for Robert Traylor in 1988...and let's not forget Seattle sending Scottie Pippen to Chicago for Olden Polynice in 1987.

Yet the worst trade in NBA history has to be Milwaukee's Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to the Lakers for four players in 1975. Right?

Nope. It's Vancouver for Memphis in time for the 2001-'02 season. With the Memphis Grizzlies currently selling upper bowl season tickets at $5 per game -- that's no typo -- in preparation for their 10th anniversary season in Tennessee, it is now officially the worst trade the NBA has ever seen.

Franchise relocations are never a badge of honour, but this one might even rank as the least satisfying in the history of North American sport.

It's all in the 2009-'10 NBA Composite Power Rankings released Monday by TheSportMarket.biz. TheSportMarket.biz.http://www.facebook.com/thesportmarket?ref=ts#!/photo.php?pid=3702634&id=280702824731

And here's why: For the fifth straight year, Memphis is dead last in the NBA in pure sport business rankings, with an anemic box office of about $325 K US per game. The Grizzlies drew an average of 13,485 fans to the FedEx Forum in 2009-'10, despite offering the NBA's bottom-priced tickets averaging $24.10 a pop.

Let's put that in perspective: in 2000-'01, their last season in Vancouver -- with the relocation imminent and local fans enduring a sixth straight losing season -- the original Grizzlies somehow posted an average attendance of 13,737 at General Motors Place.

It's true that the Grizzlies were the 18th-ranked team on the floor this season, staying in playoff contention until the final weeks of the season. Yet that makes their plight in Memphis even more troubling for the NBA, which saw the original Grizzlies make the move south-east despite considerably stronger box office results in their six seasons in Vancouver. And that was despite the fact Vancouver's Grizz never had even a sniff of a playoff berth.

The relocation of the once-proud Charlotte Hornets to New Orleans (2002) isn't working out much better, but the Katrina factor is still in play there. It's also ridiculous that Seattle no longer has its Sonics, but last year's controversial move to Oklahoma City is so far, so good on and off the floor, with the Thunder in the playoffs and earning almost three times what the Grizzlies take in every night in ticket sales.

When it comes to basketball market swaps ranking as significant upgrades, you have Minneapolis to Los Angeles in 1960, which created a lucrative heritage brand for the Lakers and -- on and off the court -- one of the most consistently high-performing basketball franchises on the planet. http://thesportmarket.blogspot.com/2010/04/nbas-la-lakers-continue-to-fire-on-all.html
But at the other end of the spectrum, we have Vancouver to Memphis in 2001...a trade that is looking worse every season, for the Grizzlies in particular and for the NBA in general.

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Salary cap helps raise the roof on NHL attendance

Attendance in the National Hockey League has grown each year since the lockout of 2004-'05, reaching an all-time high of a league-wide per game average of 16,458 in the 2009-'10 regular season which ended last Sunday.

Many would point to raucous big buildings such as the United Center in Chicago (21,356) and the Bell Centre in Montreal (21,273) as driving the league-wide average and they'd be at least partially right. Some would suggest new rules and an emerging crop of young superstars a la Sidney Crosby and Alex Ovechkin have peaked fan interest and they'd also be right. Still others would point to shootouts and three-point games and how they pump up team point totals and compress the point differentials between contenders and pretenders.

Yet if the numbers have grown consistently since the lockout, isn't it also true that parity -- pure and simple --has gone a long way to keeping the turnstiles moving? What better way to sell tickets and drive attendance than on the promise of hope: with no clear Stanley Cup favourite, more fans from more markets can dream longer about their own team's prospects of making the grade.

The numbers would suggest the bull market for NHL tickets is the result of the perfect storm of all of these factors, but none more important than team balance.

Check this out: almost half of the 30 teams in the NHL (13) are drawing more than 18,000 fans per game...more than a third (11) of the league's teams are selling out every game...five of Canada’s six franchises are at 100 per cent capacity and the sixth is not far off at 98.8 per cent...six northern U.S. markets are playing to full houses.

Most impressive is that four-fifths of the NHL is north of the magic number most people in the business covet as a sign of franchise strength; with 24 of 30 teams at or above 80% arena capacity.

Despite the bull market for NHL tickets north of the border and in northern U.S. markets, the league clearly still has its work cut out for it in the southern U.S, where seven of its eight lowest-drawing teams are currently located...five of them in sun belt markets.

That includes Phoenix. Despite a fourth-place finish in the NHL's overall standings last week, the Coyotes closed the regular season dead last in attendance, averaging a reported 11,989 at Jobing.com Arena.

Yet Phoenix and the NHL's other weak links would be even weaker were it not for the elephant in the room; a salary cap implemented in 2005 and one which has to be given at least some props for helping drive these record levels of game attendance and fan interest.

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