Just going to note, there is a glaring error in the article by ESPN. MLS is the only MEN'S Division 1 league. There are 2 women's Division 1 leagues. In fact, the presence of 2 women's D1 leagues kind of blows a hole in one of NASL's arguments and, I hope, it features prominently in their case.
The judge ruled against that the PLS violated antitrust laws. So it’s just a case of NASL trying to prove USSF used the PLS to kill them. Good luck with that. Especially since USSF gave them multiple waivers to get their shit together. Along with suggesting for them to drop down to D3 so they don’t go out of business.
That could go either way. Kessler is a shark. He'll play up the fact that at the time of the lawsuit their claims were fact. He'll argue that US Soccer is only sanctioning a second D1 women's league to hurt this lawsuit...... or some BS along those lines.
It is also worth pointing out, the judge did grant one of the motions to dismiss from USSF and MLS.. NASL cannot claim that the mere presence of the PLS is anti-trust. They will, however, be able to argue that MLS and USSF conspired to use the PLS to put them out of business.
Never underestimate US Soccer's hubris, stupidity and overall incompetence. Which the NASL ironically had a huge say in in order to put the USL out of business out of pure spite.
I haven’t followed this story in years so you will have to excuse my questions but I never understood this whole beef. Why they won’t the USSF just call or declare the NASL a D2 or D1 league? I mean what criteria do they need exactly to qualify for either? If MLS is considered by many pundits to be on par with many second or even 3rd tiers across the world in terms of skill and salaries and if the NASL will always play second fiddle to them, who really cares if they are called a 1st, 2nd or 3rd division?
This is my understanding. I'm more than happy to be corrected. The USSF introduced the Professional League Standards in 1995. I believe they expired in 2008. They were renewed or reintroduced in 2010. One of the movers of the 2010 PLS appears to have been NASL because they wanted to differentiate themselves from D3 USL. Despite allegedly agreeing to, or even driving them, NASL couldn't meet the standards immediately and were granted provisional D2 status. They continued to be granted provisional D2 status until they weren't, by which time the league had pretty much imploded, with several owners returning to USL or folding. In 2013 USSF sent out new proposed standards to all the leagues. These were approved by USSF BOD in 2014. By this time Commisso (Cosmos) and Silva (Miami FC) had become owners and jumped on the pro-rel bandwagon, claiming that USSF was breaking FIFA regulations and USSF and MLS were conspiring against them, though the new PLS weren't much different to the previous ones. A proposal to tighten the PLS further in 2015 was rejected by the BOD. Jeffrey Kessler Esq., who has a long and mixed record of litigating against USSF and MLS was more than happy to file another lawsuit. Why USSF needs standards is a whole other issue. We have had competing "first divisions" before, notably in the 1920s and the 1970s. I guess it's important when qualifying for continental competition. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_soccer_league_system?wprov=sfla1
Having standards in theory prevents USSF from picking winners and losers. We see where UEFA got when they pressed against Super League without having standard processes in place, and now they have them. If there's a standard, then anyone who meets that standard gets licensed and in theory treated equally. If there was no standard, I can almost guarantee this guy would be out here saying the lack of standards was unfair.
Professor Bank's summary of the judge's rulings this morning. https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1801296697018159575.html
I really don't have time or the will to understand all this legal talk. What is the the bototm line ruling?
The case may proceed to trial on whether USSF and MLS conspired to use the PLS to put NASL out of business.. Likely not until at least September tho. The Judge criticized NASL's expert witness for omitting NASL's cut of expansion fees, banned economic impact to sponsors and fans from being included, and required their witness to subtract NASL's actual expansion fees from potential expansion fees in a D1 world. USSF/MLS's expert witness can say that NASL fans knew about NASL's connections with Traffic, but can't infer it caused a decrease in attendance to games. There's also a number of motions to seal that were denied or granted, but not really that important for us peons. Aside from dismissing the PLS being inherently anti-competitive, the most impactful part of the judgement is the revelation that the current judge is being replaced. This is the cases third judge.
LOL. Given that NASL no longer exists, this will be a purely damages reward. I secretly hope that we get a USFL vs NFL ruling where USFL won their anti-trust case, but were only awarded $1 because USFL killed itself.
As someone who was working in the lower divisions during that early time, I remember USL having "Minimum Standards" in place, but I absolutely do not recall the Professional League Standards (as we currently think of them) being in place in 1995 or any time before 2010. (And why would they "expire?") For those too young to have been there, the 90s into the early 2000s were a real wild west time in American soccer. Teams would pop up and fold at an alarming rate. I cannot for the life of me believe that the type of stringent standards we think of - and that all the hullabaloo has been about for the last 14 years or so - were around back then. Certain standards, maybe. The ones with the time zones and owner worth and all the other things? I have never seen those, and I think I would remember them. But, like you, I am more than willing to be proven wrong. That assertion would just go against the run of play, as it were. EDIT: Today's opinion says that was true. But I stand by the assertion that whatever those standards were, they were nothing like the structure of the 2010 PLS. (Which, by the way, you can read here.)
Because they were f***ing ramshackle, that's why. They were literally trading players for hotel rooms. The standards for what should be D3/D2/D1 were put into place because teams were folding at an alarming rate for a long time, and it was bad for the ecosystem as a whole. Just DECLARING someone to be D2 or D1 because they ASKED for it, regardless of how your Eurocentric view of the world looks, would literally not be how this works. Anyone who doesn't understand that what they experience as American soccer's outdoor league structure today is absolutely not how it always was, or who doesn't get that draconian standards are one of the major reasons for what we enjoy today, is uninformed.
IIRC, when the USSF lost patience and pulled the waivers, they cited the fact that the NASL didn't have an realistic plan to meet the D2 standards within 3 years. They probably would have continued to grant provisional D2 status if the NASL had such a plan.
You mean to tell me that this: Step 1 USSF Grants Division 1 Status Step 2 ......... Step 3 Profit $$$$$ Wasn't viewed as a viable plan to meet the PLS standards? I'm shocked.....
Mixed? He's winless. Lost Fraser v MLS, costing the players several years in which they could've started collective bargaining instead of going through the courts. (I'm still grateful to several intelligent players who spoke with me for my book and gave me candid thoughts with the benefit of hindsight.) Lost the WNT's "equal pay" case and was going to lose again on appeal, but USSF needed the PR boost of a settlement. Lost the Relevent case, though it now proceeds in zombie form. Lost the bid to get the injunction that would've kept NASL in business. And if you read this opinion (I forgot about this thread -- I would've shared that opinion when I got my CourtListener alert), he lost again. Bigly. It's like the Fraser case. Sure, he can proceed to court and try to make a jury believe England has two "first divisions" that are equal, just as he tried in that case. But the judge kicked the guts out of the case. He *might* get a "win" in the Relevent case -- but only because FIFA may lose its grip on such things internationally and USSF will have neither the responsibility to enforce such rules nor any reason to defend them. The NASL case and the Relevent case are beyond moot at this point. The NASL ain't coming back. International games are staged here all the time, and USSF has little to worry about with them. These cases exist only for vengeance. Remember when USSF had a laundry list of lawsuits a few years ago? Notice that the only one that benefited the other party (aside from the WNT settlement, which, again, was done more for PR than legalities on which the WNT lost in court) was the US Soccer Foundation suit. It was the one in which the other party had a leg to stand on. It was also the one in which he wasn't representing the other party.
I think the original question was about why the Fed wouldn't simply grant D1 status as a way of "letting the baby have his bottle." If you're faced with a bunch of incompetent people, sometimes the best thing to do is get out of their way and let them fail on their own terms.