Too many other better choices of real football to watch, even if that's only on TV during the winter months.

I will always support the highest level of outdoor soccer to watch in person, but the indoor game was maybe kinda exciting back in the 80s...?? Not so much anymore for me, the players playing on those teams are just not all that exciting, they are at the fifth-sixth best level of play. Playing a "wall" pass off a real wall and then taking a full leg swing shot from five feet in front of the keeper who is now just trying to protect himself from the shot that close, is not all that great of a thing to watch during the winter months.

In training we would call the walls effect in the indoor game with boards 6v6+150 it favors the attack too much, It's not real soccer.

As I said too many other choices...

Not when only about 25% of the indoor players actually play outdoors. They're not using it for training. They're using it to continue to make a living without having to sell insurance.

And there are people who are fans strictly of the indoor game (and vice versa).

Amen! During the winter you have all of Europe playing soccer (on TV), you also have the NFL, NBA and the NHL. I guess you can throw in professional lacrosse. Hmmm, you also need sometime just to hang out at home and relax with the family.

You would also have to consider the market and what facilities are avaliable. I guess in the Twin Cities you could play at either the Target Center (which is a dump) or the Xcel Energy Center (parking is terrible). I think they would have to play in Minneapolis given the schedule the Xcel currently has. Maybe MN Soccer Guy can expand his facility and field a team there?

Regardless of the venue, you are going to have to sell at least 5-8,000 tickets per game to stay afloat. I just do not see how the smaller markets are going to do it.

Yeah, soccer is fun, but I really do not see myself going to DT Minneapolis or St. Paul on a cold winter evening to watch indoor soccer. Now I understand why my mom and dad rarely took my all the way to Bloomington to watch the Strikers at the Met Center--now that place was a real dump!

And that's true only in the winter? Good thing there's no competition any other time of year.



So you've worked that out, then, have you?

Very few indoor teams even announce 5-8000 a game, much less sell that many. There actually IS no real break-even number that works for all franchises (and, yes, venue does matter because not all venues charge you the same rent or give you the same deal). There's total money in versus total money out.

While you can say - in very general terms - that a franchise (in any sport) that is drawing paltry numbers is probably not long for the world, I defy you to look at Franchise A in one market and Franchise B in another and tell me their respective break-even points. You can't do it.

About 5000 would fill the lower bowl at a stadium hosting an indoor soccer event--makes it look full. Close off the upper level and hopeful sell some "club" level seats. You get a good deal because artifical turf is easy to maintain. The reacurring issue is travel expenses. Berine, everything else is over your head. I guess someone like you does not operate well in an enclosed venue--kind of hard to fit your ego inside an enclosed arena.

Bernie, I respect your opinion to disagree here but since an abbreviated futsal season (or just a weekend tournament) has never been attempted at a professional level I would actually like to see the MLS do this. Try it out and see what happens.

Indoor soccer is dead in this country because the best players don't play there anymore (like they did when the NASL folded and the guys went indoors because they needed a paycheck). Futsal is not true soccer as we know but it's a lot more realistic than basher-board indoor soccer.

I would like to see it tried at least by the MLS since the fan bases are in place and the guys would not have to relocate. A small venue like a college basketball arena (8-12,000) I think would keep it intimate even if 4-8,000 showed up. It would be unrealistic to think that USL I-League would draw that especially when most don't draw that now.

I'll tell you what happens: no one will go. Those who go won't go again. Because futsal is incredibly tedious.



You are correct. It's almost exactly like outdoor. So why not watch outdoor? Where the ball actually can go higher than players' waists, where it's not like watching one-and-two-touch for an hour?



Never in one million freaking years will four to eight thousand people show up to watch professional futsal in this country, with MLS players or without MLS players.



But it's not unrealistic to think that futsal could draw that? Just because "it's never been tried?" Futsal qualifying tournaments have been held in this country before (in Milwaukee and Anaheim if memory serves) and nobody goes. This is not a sport you can show to someone on television and have them say "Oh, I have got to go see that."

You can market it all you want. You can say it's "more realistic." But you'll never get people to pay to go watch it. Never. It's not even a niche of a niche.

As for the I-League, well...it's indoor soccer and it's going to be a tough sell, like everything else. As long as they don't expect too much, they might not be too disappointed.

It's so much fun watching someone discover a new message board and then spend the next couple of months posting 15 times a day and becoming an "elder" with a crash course. Really, it is.

You want to have a go at me, counselor? Bring your frigging lunch. You're a moron.

"Boy."

As to the general point, jagoff, I meant "you've run the numbers and it's based on something besides just pulling them out of your butt, right?"

No, you haven't. You think you can just wave your hand and get 5,000 people at a game. You can't. You have no experience at this. You have no knowledge. You have nothing. I'm not going to tell you how to try a case, you don't tell me about the finances of soccer. Idiot.

Bernie, you have been quiet for the last couple days. Did you run out of medication again?