By Tony Edwards – San Jose, CA (Mar 3, 2015) US Soccer Players – Not every weekend will you be able to say, ‘come see Raul play in Sacramento (on turf),’ but judging from this gallery in the Sacramento Bee, maybe not all of the 20,000 plus people who came to Saturday’s Sacramento Republic FC game against the Cosmos knew, or cared, who Raul is. The Cosmos won the friendly 3-1, but that wasn’t really the story. Sacramento sold 20,000 tickets for a friendly. Not a friendly against some European or Mexican club; not a friendly boosted by Earthquakes fans driving up I-80 East; no, it was against an NASL club.

Yes, the Cosmos brought and played Raul and Marcos Senna, but these fans were there to see their team and to send a statement to MLS. As one fan said in the article: “The support is there. The funding is there. What more could MLS want?”

It’s a good question: what more does MLS want? Big-time ownership? Check. NFL links? Check. Local government support? Check. Top 20 television market? Check.

The next step in MLS expansion might be a beauty contest between Minnesota and Sacramento. The again, the league doesn’t have to make this Sacramento or Minnesota. There are a couple of easy solutions to ’24 teams in place by 2018’ that would offer the most opportunity for everyone involved.

The underlying question in Sacramento, and in Minnesota, is simple. Why would MLS ignore the opportunities? The underlying threat is, if the MLS answer is ‘give us five more years, you’re in the next round of expansion,’ then the momentum is likely gone along with the big-time ownership. The other question is, what else does MLS want? A chimera in Miami or real cash from Minnesota and Sacramento?

For now, we’ll continue to see Sacramento outdrawing some MLS clubs and all the other NASL clubs. Led by former USMNT player Preki, the Republic will no doubt continue to be successful on the field as players realize their best chance to move to MLS might be to ride the Sacramento train. More broadly, however, we may also be seeing the last opportunity for a community to come out of nowhere, as it were, to make the successful case they belong in MLS.

We don’t often remember how a franchise ended up in Columbus. The city wasn’t on the initial list of potential franchises. With more than 11,000 season-ticket pledges, MLS paid attention back in the mid-1990s. In a league that will remain dependent on local revenue for the time being, a community that will help with a stadium and buy a considerable number of season-tickets is still important. It’s basic that you go where the market exists, now and in the future.

But Tony, Sacramento doesn’t do much for the league’s TV ratings or footprint. Even though Sacramento is a large-ish TV market, the idea that domestic soccer will draw considerable ratings any time soon is problematic in judging expansion markets. Ratings, per se, are nice, but they don’t tell the real story. Who watches is more important than how many. That’s why golf is still on television after all these years.

At this stage of MLS’ existence, there aren’t any more markets without questions. Maybe there never were. Sacramento has offered evidence. Not made up crowd numbers or vague promises by local governments, but evidence. As much as MLS might hope for a miracle in Miami, the real future of the league may well continue to be in places like Portland, Salt Lake, Seattle, Columbus, and sooner than later Sacramento.

Tony Edwards is a soccer writer from the Bay Area.

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