Going through old issues of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter and posting highlights in my own words, continuing in the footsteps of daprice82. For anyone interested, I highly recommend signing up for the actual site at f4wonline and checking out the full archives.
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1987
FUTURE YEARS ARCHIVE:
The Complete Observer Rewind Archive by daprice82

1-4-1988	1-11-1988	1-18-1988	1-25-1988
2-1-1988	2-8-1988	2-15-1988	2-22-1988

Rewinder note: Sorry about missing last week. Should be looking good going forward, just last week left no time for this.

• Crockett has taken a page out of WWF’s playbook and announced a card to counterprogram Wrestlemania. Not all the details are known yet, but on March 27 Crockett’s NWA will run a 2.5 hour show from 4 pm to 6:30 pm, the same time slot WW has reserved for Wrestlemania (remember when Wrestlemania was less than 3 hours?). It’s probable that this show will be held at the Greensboro Coliseum, and it’s being billed as some kind of “Clash of the Champions” and is expected to be packed with seven main event level matches. Flair defending against Sting will headline, along with Dusty and the Road Warriors vs. the Powers of Pain and Ivan Koloff in a barbed wire match, Tully and Arn vs. Windham and Luger for the NWA tag titles, Midnight Express vs. the Fantastics for the U.S. tag titles, Mike Rotunda vs. Jimmy Garvin for the TV title in an amateur rules match, Zbyszko vs. Shane Douglas, and tentatively Kerry and Kevin Von Erich are scheduled for this and the Crockett Cup. That last is huge, as it means there’s an open line of communication between Crockett and Ken Mantell.
  
• As for Wrestlemania, the card is set for that now. The tournament is the main point of the card, but there will also be a few other matches. Honkeytonk Man vs. Brutus Beefcake match for the IC Title is one, and Dave expects a title change here or sooner than Wrestlemania. Dave hears that Honkeytonk isn’t going to be punished for refusing to drop the belt, but it’s hard to imagine they won’t make an example of him so nobody else gets any bright ideas about refusing to go along with storylines. The British Bulldogs and Koko B. Ware vs. The Islanders and Bobby Heenan is also on the docket, while Demolition and Strike Force will fight for the tag titles. Lastly, Hercules Hernandez takes on Warrior, and a battle royal will feature all those unfortunate no-talent bums who just can’t earn a spotlight match on the card like Sam Houston, Bret Hart, and Harley Race. Celebrity appearances are to include Vanna White as guest timekeeper, Robin Leach of Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous presenting the title to the winner of the tournament (looks like a sign DiBiase will win), and Bob Uecker returning as ring announcer and color commentator.
  
• So will Clash of the Champions hurt Wrestlemania? Yes and no. Wrestlemania is theoretically an 18 match card, though double eliminations will probably help bring it down to around 16, and that many matches on a card for a 2.5 hour show (not to mention the ridiculous length of WWF ring entrances, intermissions, and other assorted nonsense they tend to pack a show full of) means most matches won’t even top 5 minutes (more on the length of the show next week: spoilers, Wrestlemania is closer to 4 hours). The card for Wrestlemania is honestly just not good. Dave thought the tournament was a stroke of genius at first, but the layout and talent in it make it much weaker than it should be. Hogan, who is the big marquee guy, is now just one of the boys here, and that means there’s no real main event to hype up because the tournament means they can’t build the show around Hogan vs. DiBiase or Hogan vs. Andre. And that probably hurts impulse purchases on ppv. It makes some sense to make Hogan one of the boys if he’s taking the summer off, though, and all indications point that way, because the goal is to make the belt the main draw of the company independent of Hogan. But that’s unlikely to work. No belt today can draw on its own. Hogan is a draw. Flair is a draw. Hennig and Perez aren’t draws, with or without belts. There’s no difference between a show where Flair defends the belt and one where he’s in a tag match, and the same goes for Hogan: they’re the draws, and fans don’t care about the belt. And you’ll notice not one word of that has a thing to do with whether Crockett will hurt WWF on Wrestlemania with their show. And that’s because for the most part, any damage done to Wrestlemania is WWF’s own fault for booking the show they’ve booked. Wrestlemania 4 will be a success. No question there, and there’s zero chance Crockett can ruin the show with their counteroffer. What they can do is cost WWF a bit of money, just like WWF did to them in January. There is a chunk of WWF’s potential market for Wrestlemania who will watch Crockett’s show instead because it is free and Wrestlemania costs $20. Wrestlemania will be a success because it’s Wrestlemania and last year’s show earned a lot of good will in the fans’ eyes as a can’t-miss show like the Super Bowl. So Crockett will have a small effect, and probably cost WWF serious money, but in the grand scheme of things it won’t be a big blow. Crockett stands to do well, as most of the country can’t get ppv so they ought to get a pretty solid rating, while WWF will most probably have a similar buyrate to last year and pull in around $18 million (which will net the company $9 million after cable gets their cut). And that’s not touching closed-circuit, which WWF will do well with, but that’s where Crockett can cost them money. Being a free alternative will probably knock off about 10% of WWF’s closed-circuit viewership, possibly more if they build well since WWF has booked Wrestlemania the way they have. And still, there’s taking into consideration the reality of what happened in January. Can Crockett get past the negative reception of its last few big shows against WWF’s run of well-received big shows?
  
• Finally, something different, it's Road Warrior Animal injury update time. Dave knows he’s made errors and wants to get everything straight in one go here. So. Animal was legit injured on January 29 in Pittsburgh. Warlord, not Barbarian, Samoan dropped Animal. It was done wrong or Animal bumped wrong or just freak accident, but thebone above Animal’s eye got smashed badly, and it wasn’t known how bad right away. He went to Greensboro for the weightlifting competition the next day, and they were worried about pressure on the eye, so while they used legit weights they just called out fake numbers (as opposed to WWF, which went with fully gimmicked weights for theirs). After the competition, Animal went to the hospital and they discovered he had a detached retina, broken bone, and his eye was knocked half an inch into his forehead. He had eye surgery, and they’re advertising his return for this coming week. No word on if that’s going to happen or not, though - they were pushing that he’d return in Philly last week when they knew he wasn’t going to be. More on this next week, because Dave keeps finding this story to change on him.
  
• [Alabama/Knoxville] The Continental split-up finally went down. The Knoxville territory will be called USA Pro Wrestling and will be running east Tennessee, with Ron Fuller running the show. Their roster includes Mongolian Stomper, Buddy Landel, the Rock & Roll RPMs (Mike Davis and Tommy Lane) as USA Tag champions, Hector Guerrero, Doug Furnas (injured with a concussion), “Bullet” Bob Armstrong, Austin Idol, and a few other names. Continental Championship Wrestling will remain in Alabama and start running Northwest Florida again as well, with David Woods running the promotion. Dutch Mantell, Wendell Cooley (currently out with a broken kneecap), Lord Humongous (Sid Eudy) and Detroit Demolition (Randy Culley, aka Moondog Rex, who actually was part of the original Demolition while Barry Darsow grew his hair out, and still wearing Demolition gear) managed by Downtown Bruno (later on it turns out Culley is not being managed by Bruno and is instead the fourth member of a stable including Robert Fuller, Dutch Mantell, and Jimmy Golden as a weak imitation of the Four Horsemen called the Studs), Dirty White Boy Tony Anthony (and Mystic as Dirty White Girl), Tom Prichard, Scott Hall, Robert Fuller and Jimmy Golden as tag champs, and some others.
  
• Memphis is going to start on Financial News Network on April 2 and run weekly on Saturday nights at 9 pm eastern. Don’t rest on this info, as it’s outdated by next week. The network has discussed possibly running New Japan on Sunday nights, but Dave thinks it’s so unlikely to actually happen he shouldn’t have bothered typing it.
  
• There’s been a fund set up to help pay Al Blake’s (Vlaidimir Petrov) legal expenses. Blake was convicted a few months ago for cocaine trafficking. Dave gives the info for people to write in and get more information about the fund.
  
• Billy Jack Haynes has been granted a promoter’s license in Oregon and started a promotion called Oregon Wrestling Federation. He apparently plans to hold six shows a week in Oregon, with himself as top babyface. Haynes will now be in direct competition with both Don Owen and Vince McMahon. Plans are to have a roster of about 14-16 wrestlers, but no names are official yet, and there’s rumor that he’ll get tv in Portland on the local ABC affiliate. Haynes plans to concentrate on big guys rather than small guys like most of the regional territories now focus on. The only name that anyone knows he has contacted is Tom Zenk. Owen also runs Washington, but no plans currently exist for Haynes to run up there. Owen’s promotion has been around since the 1920s, and there’s really not room for two regional promotions, so this should be interesting to see how it shakes out. Also interesting to see what happens with Haynes wrestling - reports from WWF indicate that he left because of poor health due to a heart condition. It’s really hard to find any real information with a quick google search, but I strongly suspect that this venture goes under before the year is out.
  
• The Simmons Research Bureau released its annual sports demographics statistics for this year, and pro wrestling is one of the sports they cover. Some good news and some bad news for wrestling, of course, and the accuracy of these numbers is debatable, but they are important in that they are perceived as facts by advertising firms and thus these are very important for figuring out advertising rates. In good news: wrestling supposedly saw a 5% increase in viewers over the past year with 30.3 million adult viewers, ranking 7th behind pro football, MLB, college football, the NBA, college basketball, and boxing. Sports viewing on the whole was down 5.6% though, and wrestling and the NBA were the only top 10 sports to see an increase (boxing was down 16.4% from last year). Dave doesn’t really take the report seriously because of its findings on roller derby. Derby supposedly saw a 29.8% increase over last year, but Dave thinks that’s just preposterous, as just two years ago roller derby had national coverage on ESPN and drew good ratings, and last year they weren’t even on the list while this year it was 20th out of 21 listed). This year? No new tapes for syndication, one Derby group isn’t even running, and the other hasn’t made new tv in over a year. So the idea that they have been getting more viewers (to the tune of a 29% increase) without putting out new material for tv is just absurd. Setting that aside, the bad news is wrestling’s demographics are considered less desirable by advertisers. The raw numbers look good and might make it a good buy for advertisers, but they’ll pay less for ad time because wrestling viewership isn’t dominated by the demographics advertisers want to market to. Wrestling, according to Simmons, is strongest among Black folks, 18-24 year old men, men more than women (61% of the audience is men, 39% women) in general, low income families, people who have less than a high school education, and single adults. In short, advertisers will look at this and conclude wrestling fans are stupid, poor, and too young (18-24 men don’t have the same level of disposable income as another age bracket up) and Black to be worth the effort of spending large amounts of money to try and reach for little perceived return.
  
• A correction on Crockett Cup - it’s set for April 22/23 in Greensvile, S.C. for the first day and Greensboro for the second day. Seedings will likely be announded on March 27, and Dave recommends readers (a lot of readers typically have attended the Cup) stay in Charlotte since it’s halfway between both sites.
  
• Wrestlemania tickets should be sold out by the time this issue reaches readers. After figuring out exactly how many freebies they’re giving, somewhere between 7,000 and 9,000 tickets were being held out of 18,165 total seats. As of February 19, around 1,500 tickets were left to be sold, and paid attendance will be in the 15,000 range. That means roughly 3,000 freebies.
  
• The Penthouse story on the Von Erichs has been delayed again. The earliest it’ll appear is August, and given the history of the family, they’ll likely suffer one real tragedy, two fake tragedies, and find a new fake relative all before the issue hits newsstands.
  
• Paul E. Dangerously had a hilarious promo moment in Southern Championship Wrestling while interviewing Randy Rose. Paul was saying he doesn’t care how much money it costs, he’s going to do away with Tommy Rich, and Rose pulls out his wallet and throws a bunch of dollar bills in the air. Paul just looks at him and says something along the lines of “I see you cashed Verne’s check.”
  
• The Bunkhouse Stampede finals did a 3.5% buyrate out of 6 million available homes, which means roughly 200,000 buys. Gross revenue should be in the $3 million range, with JCP getting about half. Dave’s sources said anything higher than 3% would be profitable, so the show wasn’t a bomb financially, but it definitely could have been better.
  
• [Memphis] Over here the AWA tag titles are held up between the Rock & Roll Express and the Midnight Rockers. The finish on February 15 in Memphis saw a ref bump, and then a second referee came out, and both referees counted simultaneous pins for each side. The next day in Lousiville (which drew 3,000, when normally they draw 1,000) they repeated the finish, and probably did the same the next night in Evansville as well. So there will be rematches in each city as well to decide the champion. Ah the days of non-televised shows being the important thing, so you could do this sort of thing and really make the title histories convoluted and confusing.
  
• [Memphis] Missy Hyatt showed up on February 20’s tv in Memphis with Doug Gilbert. She avoided the subject of Eddie Gilbert, who hasn’t made an appearance, but that’s obviously going to happen. The story as Dave understands is that Gilbert was fired by Crockett for missing two tv tapings nobody had told him he was supposed to be at. It’s a miracle he lasted as long as he did anyway, considering he somehow got into the position of UWF booker for the UWF vs. NWA feud and wound up outlasting all the ex-UWF guys except Black Bart, Sting, and Rick Steiner.
  
• New to Memphis is an opening act heel guy named Scotty the Body. Dave’s heard of him from some independent promotion somewhere, but the guy isn’t getting a push, and from what Dave’s heard of his ability, he doesn’t deserve one. Eh, never say nevermore, because this is the Observer debut of Raven.
  
• [Oregon] The Frank Bonema Memorial show on February 16 was a major disappointment, only drawing 600. The matches were all good, at least. The Grappler beat Hennig for the AWA title after using a loaded boot, but the promoter later on said he was ordered by AWA president Stanley Blackburn to hold up the title (which means the title is held up in both Minneapolis and Oregon). Given the time difference, fans in Oregon must be expected to believe Blackburn is the hardest working president in wrestling, since it was well past midnight in Minneapolis when he supposedly made the call to hold the title up.
  
• Stampede is being forced into a smaller building due to the Olympics being in Calgary. The building they have to work with seats 950, and with all the competition around town they’ll not be able to draw very well in all likelihood. And even after the Olympics, with how much money the event takes out of the economy, they’re likely to still have problems for a while.
  
• In what will remain of Continental (Alabama), Scott Hall is being set up to feud with Lord Humongous (Sid Eudy). Hall is improving, but is nowhere near ready to have a good match with Humongous, who is just awful. Probably too much softball stunting his ability.
  
• Is the world ready for a Von Erich comic book? No, not really, but we're getting one anyway. Creative Ink of Tyler, Texas is scheduling the March release of “The Saga of the Von Erich Warriors” in which Kerry, Kevin, and Fritz are taken from Earth to the planet Namoria to rescue the Namorians from attackers from the planet Nefarian. The comic winds up not coming out until 1989, and it’s a one off single issue.
  

Read: The Saga of the Von Erich Warriors

• If Ken Mantell and Jim Crockett can strike a deal, expect Flair vs. Kerry Von Erich in Texas Stadium in May. Don't hold your breath. WCCW has started doing okay business again (okay, however, does not translate to taking Crockett’s place as the number 2 promotion like some people who have way too many drugs in their system think), so that’s probably helpful to negotiations.
  
• WCCW has cut ticket prices to $5 for their February 22 Fort Worth show, headlined by the Thunderdome cage match. The Von Erichs and Steve and Schaun Simpson and Bill Irwin will face Buddy Roberts and King Parsons and Rip Morgan and Angel of Death and Eric Embry in a cage match where all ten men are in the ring tornado style, and each time a guy gets pinned he gets handcuffed to the corner and when all members of a team are handcuffed their opponents get to uncuff their partners and beat the losers for five minutes without a referee.
  
• WCCW came up with something Dave thinks is even dumber than buying a belt. On February 14 (Dave has the 15th), the Texas tag titles were contested in a best two of three falls, where the final fall went to a double countout. So they brought out a deck of cards and each team drew a card, with the high card winning the titles. So John Tatum and Jack Victory won by drawing the high card against the Fantastics.
  
• No word yet from AWA’s Feb 20 Las Vegas tapings before they go on hiatus other than the Rock & Roll Express debuted (or were scheduled to, update on this below) as babyfaces. Obviously that’s a silly move, since they have a natural feud with the Midnight Rockers if they were heels and they have always been booed in the Twin Cities. Also Tom Zenk quit the AWA on the day of the taping just as they were setting up for a feud between him and Curt Hennig (also an update on Zenk below). Zenk knows his worth, though, and he knows he’s not going to be paid decently to actually wrestle in AWA, so it’s not worth doing. Also, he seems to have no idea what the thinking behind having him debut in a draw with Billy Robinson before going on to feud with Hennig.
  
• Speaking of AWA pay, Hennig isn’t the only one who will be paid while AWA is on hiatus. Kevin Kelly and Madusa are also on guarantees, although theirs are substantially less than Hennig’s Hennig is getting around $1500 per week, while they’re on under $300 per week. Better than nothing, though.
  
• Here’s the current situation with the tag titles and world title in AWA. So the tag titles are currently held up in three different cities, but everywhere else the Midnight Rockers are definitively the tag champions. As for the world title, that’s held up in two cities and they have different challengers with claims to the title in those cities. Totally not a headache to keep track of.
  
• Verne Gagne and Wally Karbo’s lawsuit has been settled out of court. Karbo was Gagne’s partner and co-founder of the AWA when they broke away from the NWA back in 1960, and he sold his interest in the company to Gagne in 1985, from which I suspect this lawsuit emerged. From piecing info together (none of the newsletters to this point that I have contain anything about the lawsuit, and this isn’t easy to pull from the internet either), it looks like Gagne was unable or unwilling to pay what he owed to Karbo in full, so Karbo sued, and here we are with the settlement. Dave’s gotten two stories out of this settlement: one has Verne agreeing to pay in full by March 1, while one report says Karbo is settling for getting 10 cents on the dollar of what he’s owed. Maybe we’ll learn more in the future, because it’s an interesting piece of info about the death spiral of the AWA.
  
• Former UWF TV Champion Savannah Jack has developed serious heart problems. Serious enough he may need a heart transplant. He’s still working as a manager right now for Pro Wrestling America. Don’t worry - Savannah Jack will pull through this one.
  
• POWW is scheduling 20 dates in March. A few of their women can work, but most are trying to get exposure to launch into modeling or film acting, which, hey, do what you gotta do to make it. The pay for them is pretty good, Dave hears, but the issue is that their training hasn’t really given them enough to really make it in wrestling for any of them who choose to try - the ex-GLOW girls in particular apparently don’t even know what spots are, let alone how to do them. It makes the matches between the women who can work and those who can’t really bad.
  
• Global Wrestling in Florida has lost all their big name talent except Colonel Kirchner. Dave says they’ve become the “only amateur pro wrestling organization in the country” if you get what he’s saying.
  
• A Muscular Dystrophy auction at a new york night club saw a bunch of sports memorabilia auctioned off, including a pair of Bruiser Brody’s boots. The boots sold for $500.
  
• There’s a new book by Jim Friedman called Drawing Heat coming out. Dave’s going to read it this week and give impressions, but his initial impression is that it’s a smart analysis of how wrestling has changed over the years.
  
• Apparently on their last Japan tour, Abdullah the Butcher and TNT had some issues. TNT refused to work with Abby for a few days, feeling like he was being held back to make Abby look better, but they resolved it. Likewise, Tatsumi Fujinami boycotted a card where he was supposed to team with Inoki because Inoki’s ego is planet-sized. But that has also been worked out.
  
• Very little of the New Japan jr. heavyweight tournament was broadcast in Japan. TV Asahi believes that jr. heavyweight matches between Japanese guys don’t create much in the way of viewer interest, and were really only interested in the matches pitting a Japanese guy against a foreigner.
  
• All Japan is putting Killer Khan, Tiger Chung Lee, and Shunji Takano in Tenryu’s Revolution group. Khan and Lee are on the older side and it just makes Dave wish Baba would invest more in younger talent. Takano has excellent potential with this group, at least. I'll be keeping an eye on this - 1988 is where Revolution starts picking up steam.
  
• John Tenta is a candidate for most improved in Japanese Wrestling Journal for 1988. He throws the best dropkick in the entire business and makes the Road Warriors look like kids. His dropkick is so good it's actually his photo on Wikipedia
  
• According to Japanese Wrestling Journal, the December 27 New Japan show where the fans rioted in Sumo Hall drew massive ratings when Takeshi Kitano appeared. Dave just quotes a translation of what the journal says and I’ll do it here too:
  

It started off with a 6 rating while Kobayashi wrestled Hase for the jr. title however it drew nearly a 17 rating at its peak when Takeshi Kitano, one of the top comedians in Japan, appeared at the Sumo Hall for the first time. This means that Takeshi has strong ratings power for TV. This is the reason Inoki and TV Asahi joined hands with the famous comedian. However, Takeshi’s angle is fading out because of the riot held in the Sumo Hall. To make matters worse, New Japan is banned from using the Sumo Hall “for good.” There is nothing wrong with Takeshi being involved in the business since the TV was in a critical situation and New Japan had to take desperate steps to keep the show in prime time, but the plan backfired due to Inoki’s ego.

• AWA update - the Rock and Roll Express didn’t show up to the Vegas taping. So Paul Diamond and Pat Tanaka got a non-title match with the Midnight Rockers and won that.
  
• [WWF] Cuban Assassin and Badnews Brown almost had an incident at the WWF tv tapings on February 16 and 17 in Wichita and Topeka, Kansas. Brown was chasing Assassin around with a chair. Apparently there’s some bad blood between them (and their wives got into it as well) stemming from their Calgary days that led to Assassin leaving Calgary. I guess nothing actually happened beyond the chase with the chair, though, because Dave doesn’t say anything else.
  
• Recent AWA shows have been drawing between 42 and 300 fans. The Baron Von Raschke vs. Sheik Adnan grudge match they taped at the Vegas taping will definitely boost those numbers. Yesiree.
  
• Tom Zenk apparently left AWA because they kept blowing him off when he asked for guaranteed money. Verne, you can’t expect people to stick around if you won’t pay them.
  
• The AWA Title situation remains screwed up, but that’s pretty normal. On the February 21 airing of their Minneapolis tv show, Verne said all the midwestern promoters want to recognize Greg Gagne as champion and said if Stanley Blackburn doesn’t like it, then maybe AWA should get a new president. And thus Stanley Blackburn has been put in the position of being the top heel in the promotion, a full decade before Vince McMahon would actually successfully position himself the same way. Verne also compared this to the situation that led to the formation of the AWA in the first place - the Lou Thesz vs. Edouard Carpentier match in 1957 where Carpentier beat Thesz in two falls (one by DQ) and the NWA wouldn’t recognize the Carpentier as champion but all the midwestern promoters decided to recognize Carpentier as the legitimate champion (and the NWA would eventually pretend Carpentier’s reign never happened at all), which led to them uniting under Verne and Karbo a few years later when Verne beat Carpentier (by countout in the third fall) and forming the AWA. Dave’s not sure what to make of all this, but there seems to be a lot of pressure on Hennig and AWA seems to be holding Greg as an option to cover their asses if Hennig does something. But Hennig really hurt himself bad taking a bad neck and shoulder bump and is supposed to be resting, but instead he worked Vegas and Portland and the AWA office is mad that he’s missed shows (maybe they’re looking for an excuse to cut his guarantee given their financial situation). Dave just hopes Crockett’s people wake up, because Hennig would make a perfect fourth Horseman.
  

Watch: Gagne vs. Carpentier for the World Title in the match that launched the AWA

• WTBS has extended its contract with Crockett through 1994. There are a bunch of changes to the tv on TBS as well. The Saturday morning studio show is now becoming NWA Pro on a one-hour delay. The Saturday evening show will almost always be in-studio, and Sunday will be in the arena every week beginning in April with high caliber matches (they’re looking at only 3-4 matches per week for that, which should give the show decent length for undercard matches and 20 minutes for the main event). The Sunday show is aimed at getting ratings up (workrate = ratings, you know), and Saturday is mainly to build house show interest. And the TBS shows will now all be part of the syndicated package, and that should boost their syndicated rating to around the 8.5 level, which is just 1.5 points behind WWF and should get them decent ad sales income through TV.
  
• Talks between Crockett and Mantell have gotten “real cold” as of the latest info. Dave’s thinking nothing’s going to come of it at this point.
  
• FlaiSting at Clash of the Champions will have J.J. Dillon in a cage above the ring. They’ll also have three judges to decide the match in the event of a time-limit draw. TBS has also agreed to four Clash-like specials per year and Turner signed a five year deal with Crockett to co-promote ppv cards together. So look to Crockett to try to do another ppv this year.
  
• A reader suggests that since the Von Erichs keep winning Most Disgusting Promotional Tactic that Dave should rename the award. The Fritz Von Erich Promotional Tactic of the Year would allow Dave to stop spilling so much ink on how scummy the Von Erichs are and instead allow a quick reminder without having to go into detail. It's funny, because this is the last year the Von Erichs will ever win the award. Fritz's fake heart attack will win for 1988 - next year WWC will win for pushing Invader #1 (fuck Invader #1) a year after he murdered Bruiser Brody, the 90s are pretty evenly between WCW and WWF, and from 2001 on WWF/E only loses this award twice: TNA in 2007 (signing Pacman Jones) and Bellator in 2016 (Kimbo vs. Dada 5000). Really, it's the Vince McMahon Promotional Tactic of the year award at this point in all but name.
  
• Did you know that Boris Malenko was apparently blacklisted out of the mainstream promotions back in 1972? I didn’t. But apparently it followed a babyface turn in Florida where he teamed with Eddie Graham’s son Mike. Dave’s not sure why he got blacklisted, only that it was pretty common at that time. He did briefly go to Texas in 1972, maybe that had something to do with it?
  
• Magnum T.A.’s latest on-air protege is Shane Douglas. In other Magnum news, his doctors have told him he ought to be able to start jogging again by summer.
  
• Crockett is working with the people behind the Candian tv show Learning the Ropes that is being offered up for syndication soon. It’s a comedy about a school teacher whose night job is as a masked wrestler and features clips of NWA wrestlers in character, and if it’s a hit this could help Crockett get some of their guys to become real celebrities. Needless to say, you probably don't remember this show because it wasn't a hit, and if it does ring a bell it's probably thanks to Brian Zane or Wrestlecrap.
  

Watch: Learning the Ropes opening
Watch: Wrestling with Wregret's review of Learning the Ropes

• Reports of Crockett’s demise are greatly exaggerated. They drew $350,000 last weekend alone, so they’re still going reasonably strong.
  
• Big praise for the Varsity Club in the NWA. Dave’s amazed at how well the gimmick has helped Mike Rotundo turn things around when his career appeared to be stagnating.
  
• Although nearly everyone agrees Sting has surpassed Luger, Luger’s still the guy Crockett’s going to be putting time into as the young babyface. Luger’s still going to get all the chances, and Dave likens it to a first-round draft pick who turns out not so hot and a 7th-round pick who does better: you still keep giving the first guy chances because you don’t want to admit you made a mistake and because you’ve invested too much time and money into him already. Speaking of monetary investment, Luger’s contract is seven times more lucrative than Sting’s. So yeah, they’re gonna run with Luger to make that money worth it because the sunk cost fallacy is a difficult one to get over. Sting’s contract runs out in May, so those negotiations could become quite interesting.
  

THURSDAY: Who will win the Wrestlemania tournament?, Michael Hayes gets the book in World Class, and more

TL;DR: Man with too much time on his hands goes deep down the rabbit hole on a concept this sub already didn’t seem that enthusiastic about. If you really want to skip ahead, CTRL+F “verdict” and it’ll get you there.
Two days ago, u/MrPhillyj2wns made a post asking whether USL should launch a D1 league in order to compete in Concacaf. From the top voted replies, it appears this made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move.
But I’ve been at home for eight weeks and I am terribly, terribly bored.
So, I present to you this overview of what the USL pyramid might look like if Jake Edwards got a head of steam and attempted to establish a USSF-sanctioned first division. This is by no means an endorsement of such a proposal or even a suggestion that USL SHOULD do such a thing. It is merely an examination of whether they COULD.
Welcome to the Thunderdome USL Premiership
First, there are some base-level assumptions we must make in this exercise, because it makes me feel more scientific and not like a guy who wrote this on Sunday while watching the Belarusian Premier League (Go BATE Borisov!).

1. All D1 teams must comply with known USSF requirements for D1 leagues (more on that later).
   
2. MLS, not liking this move, will immediately remove all directly-owned affiliate clubs from the USL structure (this does not include hybrid ownerships, like San Antonio FC – NYCFC). This removes all MLS2 teams but will not affect Colorado Springs, Reno, RGVFC and San Antonio.
   
3. The USL will attempt to maintain both the USL Championship and USL League One, with an eventual mind toward creating the pro/rel paradise that is promised in Relegations 3:16.
   
4. All of my research regarding facility size and ownership net worth is correct – this is probably the biggest leap of faith we have to make, since googling “NAME net worth” and “CITY richest people” doesn’t seem guaranteed to return accurate results.
   
5. The most a club can increase its available seating capacity to meet D1 requirements in a current stadium is no more than 1,500 seats (10% of the required 15,000). If they need to add more, they’ll need a new facility.
   
6. Let’s pretend that people are VERY willing to sell. It’s commonly acknowledged that the USL is a more financially feasible route to owning a soccer club than in MLS (c.f. MLS-Charlotte’s reported $325 million expansion fee) and the USSF has some very strict requirements for D1 sanctioning. It becomes pretty apparent when googling a lot of team’s owners that this requirement isn’t met, so let’s assume everyone that can’t sells to people who meet the requirements.
   

(Known) USSF D1 league requirements:
- League must have 12 teams to apply and 14 teams by year three
- Majority owner must have a net worth of $40 million, and the ownership group must have a total net worth of $70 million. The value of an owned stadium is not considered when calculating this value.
- Must have teams located in the Eastern, Central and Pacific time zones
- 75% of league’s teams must be based in markets with at a metro population of at least 1 million people.
- All league stadiums must have a capacity of at least 15,000
The ideal club candidate for the USL Premiership will meet the population and capacity requirements in its current ground, which will have a grass playing surface. Of the USL Championship’s 27 independent/hybrid affiliate clubs, I did not find one club that meets all these criteria as they currently stand.
Regarding turf fields, the USSF does not have a formal policy regarding the ideal playing surface but it is generally acknowledged that grass is superior to turf. 6 of 26 MLS stadiums utilize turf, or roughly 23% of stadiums. We’ll hold a similar restriction for our top flight, so 2-3 of our top flight clubs can have turf fields. Seem fair?
Capacity is going to be the biggest issue, since the disparity between current requirements for the second-tier (5,000) and the first tier (15,000) is a pretty massive gap. Nice club you have there, triple your capacity and you’re onto something. As a result, I have taken the liberty of relocating certain (read: nearly all) clubs to new grounds, trying my utmost to keep those clubs in their current markets and –importantly--, ensure they play on grass surfaces.
So, let’s do a case-by-case evaluation and see if we can put together 12-14 teams that meet the potential requirements, because what else do you have to do?
For each club’s breakdown, anything that represents a chance from what is currently true will be underlined.
Candidate: Birmingham Legion FC
Location (Metro population): Birmingham, Ala. (1,151,801)
Time zone: Central
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Legion Field (FieldTurf, 71,594)
Potential owner: Stephens Family (reported net worth $4 billion)
Notes: Birmingham has a pretty strong candidacy. Having ditched the 5,000-seater BBVA Field for Legion Field, which sits 2.4 miles away, they’ve tapped into the city’s soccer history. Legion Field hosted portions of both the men’s and women’s tournaments at the 1996 Olympics, including a 3-1 U.S. loss to Argentina that saw 83,183 pack the house. The Harbert family seemed like strong ownership contenders, but since the death of matriarch Marguerite Harbert in 2015, it’s unclear where the wealth in the family is concentrated, so the Stephens seem like a better candidate. The only real knock that I can think of is that we really want to avoid having clubs play on turf, so I’d say they’re on the bubble of our platonic ideal USL Prem.
Candidate: Charleston Battery
Location (Metro population): Charleston, S.C. (713,000)
Time zone: Eastern
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Johnson Hagood Stadium (Grass, ~14,700)
Potential owner: Anita Zucker (reported net worth $3 billion)
Notes: Charleston’s candidacy isn’t looking great. Already disadvantaged due to its undersized metro population, a move across the Cooper River to Johnson Hagood Stadium is cutting it close in terms of capacity. The stadium, home to The Citadel’s football team, used to seat 21,000, before 9,300 seats on the eastern grandstand were torn down in 2017 to deal with lead paint that had been used in their construction. Renovation plans include adding 3,000 seats back in, which could hit 15,000 if they bumped it to 3,300, but throw in a required sale by HCFC, LLC (led by content-creation platform founder Rob Salvatore) to chemical magnate Anita Zucker, and you’ll see there’s a lot of ifs and ands in this proposal.
Candidate: Charlotte Independence
Location (Metro population): Charlotte, N.C. (2,569, 213)
Time zone: Eastern
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Jerry Richardson Stadium (Turf, 15,314)
Potential owner: James Goodnight (reported net worth $9.1 billion)
Notes: Charlotte ticks a lot of the boxes. A move from the Sportsplex at Matthews to UNC-Charlotte’s Jerry Richardson stadium meets capacity requirements, but puts them on to the dreaded turf. Regrettably, nearby American Legion Memorial Stadium only seats 10,500, despite a grass playing surface. With a sizeable metro population (sixth-largest in the USL Championship) and a possible owner in software billionaire James Goodnight, you’ve got some options here. The biggest problem likely lies in direct competition for market share against a much better-funded MLS Charlotte side due to join the league in 2021.
Candidate: Hartford Athletic
Location (Metro population): Hartford, Conn. (1,214,295)
Time zone: Eastern
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Pratt & Whitney Stadium (Grass, 38,066)
Potential owner: Ray Dalio (reported net worth $18.4 billion)
Notes: Okay, I cheated a bit here, having to relocate Hartford to Pratt & Whitney Stadium, which is technically in East Hartford, Conn. I don’t know enough about the area to know if there’s some kind of massive beef between the two cities, but the club has history there, having played seven games in 2019 while Dillon Stadium underwent renovations. If the group of local businessmen that currently own the club manage to attract Dalio to the table, we’re on to something.
Candidate: Indy Eleven
Location (Metro population): Indianapolis, Ind. (2,048,703)
Time zone: Eastern
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Lucas Oil Stadium (Turf, 62,421)
Potential owner: Jim Irsay (reported net worth of $3 billion)
Notes: Indy Eleven are a club that are SO CLOSE to being an ideal candidate – if it weren’t for Lucas Oil Stadium’s turf playing surface. Still, there’s a lot to like in this bid. I’m not going to lie, I have no idea what current owner and founder Ersal Ozdemir is worth, but it seems like there might be cause for concern. A sale to Irsay, who also owns the NFL Indianapolis (nee Baltimore) Colts, seems likely to keep the franchise there, rather than make a half-mile move to 14,230 capacity Victory Field where the AAA Indianapolis Indians play and expand from there.
Candidate: Louisville City FC
Location (Metro population): Louisville, Ky. (1,297,310)
Time zone: Eastern
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Lynn Family Stadium (Grass, 14,000, possibly expandable to 20,000)
Potential owner: Wayne Hughes (reported net worth $2.8 billion)
Notes: I’m stretching things a bit here. Lynn Family stadium is currently listed as having 11,700 capacity that’s expandable to 14,000, but they’ve said that the ground could hold as many as 20,000 with additional construction, which might be enough to grant them a temporary waiver from USSF. If the stadium is a no-go, then there’s always Cardinal Stadium, home to the University of Louisville’s football team, which seats 65,000 but is turf. Either way, it seems like a sale to someone like Public Storage founder Wayne Hughes will be necessary to ensure the club has enough capital.
Candidate: Memphis 901 FC
Location (Metro population): Memphis, Tenn. (1,348,260)
Time zone: Central
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Liberty Bowl Stadium (Turf, 58,325)
Potential owner: Fred Smith (reported net worth $3 billion)
Notes: Unfortunately for Memphis, AutoZone Park’s 10,000 seats won’t cut it at the D1 level. With its urban location, it would likely prove tough to renovate, as well. Liberty Bowl Stadium more than meets the need, but will involve the use of the dreaded turf. As far as an owner goes, FedEx founder Fred Smith seems like a good local option.
Candidate: Miami FC, “The”
Location (Metro population): Miami, Fla. (6,158,824)
Time zone: Eastern
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Riccardo Silva Stadium (FieldTurf, 20,000)
Potential owner: Riccardo Silva (reported net worth $1 billion)
Notes: Well, well, well, Silva might get his wish for top-flight soccer, after all. He’s got the money, he’s got the metro, and his ground has the capacity. There is the nagging issue of the turf, though. Hard Rock Stadium might present a solution, including a capacity of 64,767 and a grass playing surface. It is worth noting, however, that this is the first profile where I didn’t have to find a new potential owner for a club.
Candidate: North Carolina FC
Location (Metro population): Durham, N.C. (1,214,516 in The Triangle)
Time zone: Eastern
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Carter-Finley Stadium (Grass/Turf, 57,583)
Potential owner: Steve Malik (precise net worth unknown) / Dennis Gillings (reported net worth of $1.7 billion)
Notes: We have our first “relocation” in North Carolina FC, who were forced to trade Cary’s 10,000-seat WakeMed Soccer Park for Carter-Finley Stadium in Durham, home of the NC State Wolfpack and 57,583 of their closest friends. The move is a whopping 3.1 miles, thanks to the close-knit hub that exists between Cary, Durham and Raleigh. Carter-Finley might be my favorite of the stadium moves in this exercise. The field is grass, but the sidelines are artificial turf. Weird, right? Either way, it was good enough for Juventus to play a friendly against Chivas de Guadalajara there in 2011. Maybe the move would be pushed for by new owner and medical magnate Dennis Gillings, whose British roots might inspire him to get involved in the Beautiful Game. Straight up, though, I couldn’t find a net worth for current owner Steve Malik, though he did sell his company MedFusion for $91 million in 2010, then bought it back for an undisclosed amount and sold it again for $43 million last November. I don’t know if Malik has the juice to meet D1 requirements, but I suspect he’s close.
Candidate: Pittsburgh Riverhounds SC
Location (Metro population): Pittsburgh, Penn. (2,362,453)
Time zone: Eastern
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Heinz Field (Grass, 64,450)
Potential owner: Henry Hillman (reported net worth $2.5 billion)
Notes: I don’t know a ton about the Riverhounds, but this move in particular feels like depriving a pretty blue-collar club from its roots. Highmark Stadium is a no-go from a seating perspective, but the Steelers’ home stadium at Heinz Field would more than meet the requirements and have a grass surface that was large enough to be sanctioned for a FIFA friendly between the U.S. WNT and Costa Rica in 2015. As for an owner, Tuffy Shallenberger (first ballot owner name HOF) doesn’t seem to fit the USSF bill, but legendary Pittsburgh industrialist Henry Hillman might. I’m sure you’re asking, why not the Rooney Family, if they’ll play at Heinz Field? I’ll tell you: I honestly can’t seem to pin down a value for the family. The Steelers are valued at a little over a billion and rumors persist that Dan Rooney is worth $500 million, but I’m not sure. I guess the Rooneys would work too, but it’s a definite departure from an owner in Shallenberger who was described by one journalist as a guy who “wears boots, jeans, a sweater and a trucker hat.”
Candidate: Saint Louis FC
Location (Metro population): St. Louis, Mo. (2,807,338)
Time zone: Central
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Busch Stadium (Grass, 45,494)
Potential owner: William DeWitt Jr. (reported net worth $4 billion)
Notes: Saint Louis has some weirdness in making the jump to D1. Current CEO Jim Kavanaugh is an owner of the MLS side that will begin play in 2022. The club’s current ground at West Community Stadium isn’t big enough, but perhaps a timely sale to Cardinals owner William DeWitt Jr. could see the club playing games at Busch Stadium, which has a well established history of hosting other sports like hockey, college football and soccer (most recently a U.S. WNT friendly against New Zealand in 2019). The competition with another MLS franchise wouldn’t be ideal, like Charlotte, but with a big enough population and cross marketing from the Cardinals, maybe there’s a winner here. Wacko idea: If Busch doesn’t pan out, send them to The Dome. Sure, it’s a 60k turf closed-in stadium, but we can go for that retro NASL feel and pay homage to our nation’s soccer history.
Candidate: Tampa Bay Rowdies
Location (Metro population): Tampa, Fla. (3,068,511)
Time zone: Eastern
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Raymond James Stadium (Grass, 65,518)
Potential owner: Edward DeBartolo Jr. (reported net worth $3 billion)
Notes: This one makes me sad. Despite having never been there, I see Al Lang Stadium as an iconic part of the Rowdies experience. Current owner Bill Edwards proposed an expansion to 18,000 seats in 2016, but the move seems to have stalled out. Frustrated with the city’s lack of action, Edwards sells to one-time San Francisco 49ers owner Edward DeBartolo Jr., who uses his old NFL connections to secure a cushy lease at the home of the Buccaneers in Ray Jay, the site of a 3-1 thrashing of Antigua and Barbuda during the United States’ 2014 World Cup Qualifying campaign.
Breather. Hey, we finished the Eastern Conference teams. Why are you still reading this? Why am I still writing it? Time is a meaningless construct in 2020 my friends, we are adrift in the void, fueled only by brief flashes of what once was and what may yet still be.
Candidate: Austin Bold FC
Location (Metro population): Austin, Texas (2,168,316)
Time zone: Central
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Darrel K Royal – Texas Memorial Stadium (FieldTurf, 95,594)
Potential owner: Michael Dell (reported net worth of $32.3 billion)
Notes: Anthony Precourt’s Austin FC has some unexpected competition and it comes in the form of tech magnate Michael Dell. Dell, were he to buy the club, would be one of the richest owners on our list and could flash his cash in the new first division. Would he have enough to convince Darrel K Royal – Texas Memorial Stadium (I’m not kidding, that’s its actual name) to go back to a grass surface, like it did from ’96-’08? That’s between Dell and nearly 100,000 UT football fans, but everything can be had for the right price.
Candidate: Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC
Location (Metro population): Colorado Springs, Colo. (738,939)
Time zone: Mountain
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Falcon Stadium (FieldTurf, 46,692)
Potential owner: Charles Ergen (reported net worth $10.8 billion)
Notes: Welcome to Colorado Springs. We have hurdles. For the first time in 12 candidates, we’re back below the desired 1 million metro population mark. Colorado Springs actually plans to build a $35 million, 8,000 seat venue downtown that will be perfect for soccer, but in our timeline that’s 7,000 seats short. Enter Falcon Stadium, home of the Air Force Academy Falcons football team. Seems perfect except for the turf, right? Well, the tricky thing is that Falcon Stadium is technically on an active military base and is (I believe) government property. Challenges to getting in and out of the ground aside, the military tends to have a pretty grim view of government property being used by for-profit enterprises. Maybe Charles Ergen, founder and chairman of Dish Network, would be able to grease the right wheels, but you can go ahead and throw this into the “doubtful” category. It’s a shame, too. 6,035 feet of elevation is one hell of a home-field advantage.
Candidate: El Paso Locomotive FC
Location: El Paso, Texas
Time zone: Mountain
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Sun Bowl (FieldTurf, 51,500)
Potential owner: Paul Foster (reported net worth $1.7 billion)
Notes: God bless Texas. When compiling this list, I found so many of the theoretical stadium replacements were nearly serviceable by high school football fields. That’s insane, right? Anyway, Locomotive don’t have to settle for one of those, they’ve got the Sun Bowl, which had its capacity reduced in 2001 to a paltry 51,500 (from 52,000) specifically to accommodate soccer. Sure, it’s a turf surface, but what does new owner Paul Foster (who is only the 1,477th wealthiest man in the world, per Forbes) care, he’s got a team in a top league. Side note: Did you know that the Sun Bowl college football game is officially, through sponsorship, the Tony the Tiger Sun Bowl? Why is it not the Frosted Flakes Sun Bowl? Why is the cereal mascot the promotional name of the football game? What are you doing, Kellogg’s?
Candidate: Las Vegas Lights FC
Location: Las Vegas, Nev. (2,227,053)
Time zone: Pacific
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Allegiant Stadium (Grass, 61,000)
Potential owner: Sheldon Adelson (reported net worth $37.7 billion)
Notes: Sin City. You had to know that the club that once signed Freddy Adu because “why not” was going to go all out in our flashy hypothetical proposal. Thanks to my narrative control of this whole thing, they have. Adelson is the second-richest owner in the league and has decided to do everything first class. That includes using the new Raiders stadium in nearby unincorporated Paradise, Nevada, and spending boatloads on high profile transfers. Zlatan is coming back to the U.S., confirmed.
Candidate: New Mexico United
Location: Albuquerque, N.M.
Time zone: Mountain
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Isotopes Park – officially Rio Grande Credit Union Field at Isotopes Park (Grass, 13,500 – 15,000 with expansion)
Potential owner: Maloof Family (reported net worth $1 billion)
Notes: New Mexico from its inception went deep on the community vibe, and I’ve tried to replicate that in this bid. The home field of Rio Grande Cr---I’m not typing out the whole thing—Isotopes Park falls just within the expansion rules we set to make it to 15,000 (weird, right?) and they’ve found a great local ownership group in the Lebanese-American Maloof (formerly Maalouf) family from Las Vegas. The only thing to worry about would be the metro population, but overall, this could be one of the gems of USL Prem.
Candidate: Oklahoma City Energy FC
Location: Oklahoma City, Okla. (1,396,445)
Time zone: Central
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Chickasaw Bricktown Ballpark (Grass, 13,066)
Potential owner: Harold Hamm (reported net worth $14.2 billion)
Notes: There’s a bright golden haze on the meadow and it says it’s time to change stadiums and owners to make it to D1. A sale to oil magnate Harold Hamm would give the club the finances it needs, but Chickasaw Bricktown Ballpark (home of the OKC Dodgers) actually falls outside of the boundary of what would meet capacity if 1,500 seats were added. Could the club pull off a move to Gaylord Family Oklahoma Memorial Stadium in Norman, Oklahoma – home of the Oklahoma Sooners? Maybe, but at 20 miles, this would be a reach.
Candidate: Orange County SC
Location: Irvine, Calif. (3,176, 000 in Orange County)
Time zone: Pacific
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Angels Stadium of Anaheim (Grass, 43,250)
Potential owner: Arte Moreno (reported net worth $3.3 billion)
Notes: You’ll never convince me that Rangers didn’t choose to partner with Orange County based primarily on its name. Either way, a sale to MLB Angels owner Arte Moreno produces a fruitful partnership, with the owner choosing to play his newest club out of the existing Angels stadium in OC. Another baseball conversion, sure, but with a metro population of over 3 million and the closest thing this hypothetical league has to an LA market, who’s complaining?
Candidate: Phoenix Rising FC
Location: Phoenix, Ariz. (4,857,962)
Time zone: Arizona
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): State Farm Stadium (Grass, 63,400)
Potential owner: Ernest Garcia II (reported net worth $5.7 billion)
Notes: We’re keeping it local with new owner and used car guru Ernest Garcia II. His dad owned a liquor store and he dropped out of college, which is making me feel amazing about my life choices right now. Casino Arizona Field is great, but State Farm Stadium is a grass surface that hosted the 2019 Gold Cup semifinal, so it’s a clear winner. Throw in Phoenix’s massive metro population and this one looks like a lock.
Candidate: Reno 1868 FC
Location: Reno, Nev. (425,417)
Time zone: Pacific
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Mackay Stadium (FieldTurf, 30,000)
Potential owner: Nancy Walton Laurie (reported net worth $7.1 billion)
Notes: The Biggest Little City on Earth has some serious barriers to overcome, thanks to its low metro population. A sale to Walmart heiress Nancy Walton Laurie and 1.6 mile-move to Mackay Stadium to split space with the University of Nevada, Reno makes this bid competitive, but the turf surface is another knock against it.
Candidate: Rio Grande Valley FC
Location: Edinburg, Texas (900,304)
Time zone: Central
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): McAllen Memorial Stadium (FieldTurf, 13,500 – 15,000 with expansion)
Potential owner: Alice Louise Walton (reported net worth $45 billion)
Notes: Yes, I have a second straight Walmart heiress on the list. She was the first thing that popped up when I googled “McAllen Texas richest people.” The family rivalry has spurred Walton to buy a club as well, moving them 10 miles to McAllen Memorial Stadium which, as I alluded to earlier, is a straight up high school football stadium with a full color scoreboard. Toss in an additional 1,500 seats and you’ve met the minimum, despite the turf playing surface.
Candidate: San Antonio FC
Location: San Antonio, Texas (2,550,960)
Time zone: Central
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Alamodome (FieldTurf, 64,000)
Potential owner: Red McCombs (reported net worth $1.6 billion)
Notes: I wanted to keep SAFC in the Spurs family, since the franchise is valued at $1.8 billion. That said, I didn’t let the Rooneys own the Riverhounds based on the Steelers’ value and it felt wrong to change the rules, so bring on Clear Channel co-founder Red McCombs. Toyota Field isn’t viable in the first division, but for the Alamodome, which was built in 1993 in hopes of attracting an NFL franchise (and never did), San Antonio can finally claim having *a* national football league team in its town (contingent on your definition of football). Now if only we could do something about that turf…
Candidate: San Diego Loyal SC
Location: San Diego, Calif. (3,317,749)
Time zone: Pacific
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): SDCCU Stadium (formerly Qualcomm) (Grass, 70,561)
Potential owner: Phil Mickelson (reported net worth $91 million)
Notes: Yes, golf’s Phil Mickelson. The existing ownership group didn’t seem to have the wherewithal to meet requirements, and Phil seemed to slot right in. As an athlete himself, he might be interesting in the new challenges of a top flight soccer team. Toss in a move to the former home of the chargers and you might have a basis for tremendous community support.
Candidate: FC Tulsa
Location: Tulsa, Okla. (991,561)
Time zone: Central
Stadium (playing surface, capacity): Skelly Field at H.A. Chapman Stadium (FieldTurf, 30,000)
Potential owner: George Kaiser ($10 billion)
Notes: I’m a fan of FC Tulsa’s rebrand, but if they want to make the first division, more changes are necessary. A sale to Tulsa native and one of the 100 richest men in the world George Kaiser means that funding is guaranteed. A move to Chapman Stadium would provide the necessary seats, despite the turf field. While the undersize population might be an issue at first glance, it’s hard to imagine U.S. Soccer not granting a waiver over a less than a 10k miss from the mark.
And that’s it! You made it. Those are all of the independent/hybrid affiliates in the USL Championship, which means that it’s time for our…
VERDICT: As an expert who has studied this issue for almost an entire day now, I am prepared to pronounce which USL Championships could be most ‘ready” for a jump to the USL Prem. A reminder that of the 27 clubs surveyed, 0 of them met our ideal criteria (proper ownership $, metro population, 15,000+ stadium with grass field).
Two of them, however, met almost all of those criteria: Indy Eleven and Miami FC. Those two clubs may use up two of our three available turf fields right from the outset, but the other factors they hit (particularly Silva’s ownership of Miami) makes them difficult, if not impossible to ignore for the top flight.
But who fill in the rest of the slots? Meet the entire 14-team USL Premier League:
Hartford Athletic
Indy Eleven
Louisville City FC
Miami FC
North Carolina FC
Pittsburgh Riverhounds SC
Tampa Bay Rowdies
Saint Louis FC
San Antonio FC
New Mexico United
Phoenix Rising FC
Las Vegas Lights FC
Orange County SC
San Diego Loyal SC
Now, I shall provide my expert rationale for each club’s inclusion/exclusion, which can be roughly broken down into four categories.
Firm “yes”
Hartford Athletic: It’s a good market size with a solid stadium. With a decent investor and good community support, you’ve got potential here.
Indy Eleven: The turf at Lucas Oil Stadium is no reason to turn down a 62,421 venue and a metro population of over 2 million.
Louisville City FC: Why doesn’t the 2017 & 2018 USL Cup champion deserve a crack at the top flight? They have the market size, and with a bit of expansion have the stadium at their own SSS. LCFC, you’re in.
Miami FC, “The”: Our other blue-chip recruit on the basis of ownership value, market size and stadium capacity. Yes, that field is turf, but how could you snub Silva’s chance to claim victory as the first division 1 club soccer team to play in Miami?
Pittsburgh Riverhounds SC: Pittsburgh sacrificed a lot to be here (according to my arbitrary calculations). Their market size and the potential boon of soccer at Heinz Field is an important inclusion to the league.
Saint Louis FC: Willie hears your “Busch League” jokes, Willie don’t care. A huge market size, combined with the absence of an NFL franchise creates opportunity. Competition with the MLS side, sure, but St. Louis has serious soccer history and we’re willing to bet it can support two clubs.
Tampa Bay Rowdies: With a huge population and a massive stadium waiting nearby, Tampa Bay seems like too good of an opportunity to pass up for the USL Prem.
Las Vegas Lights FC: Ostentatious, massive and well-financed, Las Vegas Lights FC is everything that the USL Premier League would need to assert that it didn’t intend to play second fiddle to MLS. Players will need to be kept on a short leash, but this is a hard market to pass up on.
Phoenix Rising FC: Huge population, big grass field available nearby and a solid history of success in recent years. No brainer.
San Diego Loyal SC: New club? Yes, massive population in a market that recently lost an absolutely huge sports presence? Also yes. This could be the USL Prem’s Seattle.
Cautious “yes”
New Mexico United: You have to take a chance on New Mexico United. The club set the league on fire with its social media presence and its weight in the community when it entered the league last season. The market may be slightly under USSF’s desired 1 million, but fervent support (and the ability to continue to use Isotopes Park) shouldn’t be discounted.
North Carolina FC: Carter-Finley’s mixed grass/turf surface is a barrier, to be sure, but the 57,000+ seats it offers (and being enough to offset other fully-turf offerings) is enough to put it in the black.
Orange County SC: It’s a top-tier club playing in a MLB stadium. I know it seems unlikely that USSF would approve something like that, but believe me when I say “it could happen.” Orange County is a massive market and California likely needs two clubs in the top flight.
San Antonio FC: Our third and only voluntary inclusion to the turf fields in the first division, we’re counting on San Antonio’s size and massive potential stadium to see it through.
Cautious “no”
Birmingham Legion FC: The town has solid soccer history and a huge potential venue, but the turf playing surface puts it on the outside looking in.
Memphis 901 FC: Like Birmingham, not much to dislike here outside of the turf playing surface at the larger playing venue.
Austin Bold FC: See the other two above.
FC Tulsa: Everything’s just a little bit off with this one. Market’s slightly too small, stadium has turf. Just not enough to put it over the top.
Firm “no”
Charleston Battery: Small metro and a small potential new stadium? It’s tough to say yes to the risk.
Charlotte Independence: A small new stadium and the possibility of having to compete with an organization that just paid over $300 million to join MLS means it’s best for this club to remain in the USL Championship.
Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC: When a club’s best chance to meet a capacity requirement is to host games at a venue controlled by the military, that doesn’t speak well to a club’s chances.
El Paso Locomotive FC: An undersized market and a turf field that meets capacity requirements is the death knell for this one.
Oklahoma City Energy FC: Having to expand a baseball field to meet requirements is a bad start. Having to potentially play 20 miles away from your main market is even worse.
Reno 1868 FC: Population nearly a half-million short of the federation’s requirements AND a turf field at the hypothetical new stadium makes impossible to say yes to this bid.
Rio Grande Valley FC: All the seat expansions in the world can’t hide the fact that McAllen Memorial Stadium is a high school stadium through and through.
Here’s who’s left in the 11-team Championship:
Birmingham Legion FC
Charleston Battery
Charlotte Independence
Memphis 901 FC
Austin Bold FC
Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC
El Paso Locomotive FC
Oklahoma City Energy FC
Reno 1868 FC
Rio Grande Valley FC
FC Tulsa
With MLS folding the six affiliates it has in USL League One, the league is a little bit thin (especially considering USSF’s requirements for 8 teams for lower level leagues), but seems definitely able to expand up to the necessary numbers with Edwards’ allusions to five new additions this year:
Chattanooga Red Wolves SC
Forward Madison FC
Greenville Triumph SC
Union Omaha
Richmond Kickers
South Georgia Tormenta
FC Tucson
Format of Assorted Leagues – This (like everything in this post) is pure conjecture on my part, but here are my thoughts on how these leagues might function in a first year while waiting for additional expansion.
USL Premier – We’ll steal from the 12-team Scottish Premiership. Each club plays the other 11 clubs 3 times, with either one or two home matches against each side. When each club has played 33 matches, the top six and bottom six separate, with every club playing an additional five matches (against each other team in its group). The top club wins the league. The bottom club is automatically relegated. The second-bottom club will enter a two-legged playoff against someone (see below) from the championship playoffs.
USL Championship -- 11 clubs is a challenge to schedule for. How about every club plays everyone else three times (either one or two home matches against each side)? Top four clubs make the playoffs, which are decided by two-legged playoffs. The winner automatically goes up. I need feedback on the second part – is it better to have the runner-up from the playoffs face the second-bottom club from the Premiership, or should the winner of the third-place match-up get the chance to face them to keep drama going in both playoff series? As for relegation, we can clearly only send down the last place club while the third division is so small.
USL League One – While the league is so small, it doesn’t seem reasonable to have the clubs play as many matches as the higher divisions. Each club could play the other six clubs four times – twice at home and twice away – for a very equitable 24-match regular season, which would help restrict costs and still provide a chance to determine a clear winner. Whoever finishes top of the table goes up.
And there you have it, a hypothetical look at how the USL could build a D1 league right now. All it would take is a new stadium for almost the entire league and new owners for all but one of the 27 clubs, who wouldn’t feel that their property would be massively devalued if they got relegated.
Well that’s our show. I’m curious to see what you think of all of this, especially anything that you think I may have overlooked (I’m sure there’s plenty). Anyway, I hope you’re all staying safe and well.