the alamodome and bc place: how the mls is viable in san antonio

This is an article I wrote from Crocketteers.com, San Antonio's Premier Soccer Supporters Group.

One of the best innovation strategies in business is to do nothing. Sit and wait and allow those around you to innovate. Sometimes the smart companies pay for the R&D to make incremental changes to someone else’s good idea rather than paying the tremendous R&D to create the idea in the first place.

It is in that spirit, San Antonio, that I invite you to tour Vancouver’s BC Place with me.

As you know, Vancouver is going to begin play in the MLS in 2011. They will be playing home games at BC Place for the foreseeable future.

BC Place is a 60,000 seat stadium, whose current primary tenant is the BC Lions Canadian Football League Team. That is to say, BC Place is a 60,000 seat football stadium. Built in 1983 in part to attract a Major League Baseball team that never materialized, BC Place hosts trade and consumer shows (Boat Shows, Home and Garden Shows) and motorsports events (Monster Jam, anyone?) in addition to the CFL’s Lions. BC Place, though relatively busy, operates at an annual loss.

Sound familiar?

The Alamodome is a 65,000 seat stadium and is currently lacking a regular tenant. Built in 1993 in part to attract a National Football League team that never materialized, the Alamodome plays host to annual football games, trade and consumer shows, motorsports events, and annual marching band competitions. The Alamodome, though relatively busy, operates at an annual loss.

Once upon a time, the MLS had an agreement with the city of San Antonio to bring a team to the Alamodome, much like the deal that they currently have to place an MLS franchise in Vancouver’s BC Place. Politics quashed the deal as the reins of power changed hands.

Then, this spring, we get word that Spurs Sports & Entertainment (SS&E) is interested in bringing professional soccer to San Antonio, provided they have a soccer-specific-stadium (SSS). An SSS would bring in maximum revenue and the group made the statement that the economics at the Alamodome don’t work.

Perhaps we need to introduce our friends at SS&E to BC Place. Like the Alamodome’s long, lost twin, BC Place is not only viable for a profitable MLS team, but it is viable and it is TEN YEARS OLDER. BC Place will be undergoing limited renovations that will create an intimate soccer venue from a 60,000 seat barn. As you can see in the photo, BC Place would limit the seating to the lower bowl, integrate a centrally hung scoreboard, and project a visually striking image through the use of a translucent canopy that prevents the empty upper bowl from even being seen, giving a fan the impression and experience of a true European-style soccer environment.

The Alamodome could be transformed in much the same way. It could probably be done even cheaper than the work in Vancouver, thanks to the Alamodome’s relative youth. It could be done. And if the economics work in Vancouver, are we really to believe that they wouldn’t work here?

All of this to say one thing: San Antonio could host the MLS tomorrow. San Antonio has the population, the desire, the corporate base, and the facility.

All we need are leaders that will give it a chance. More on that soon…

of gridiron and the not-so-vacuous void

There was a moment in February of 2004 when a tiny newspaper blurb from The Star, a South African newspaper, allowed me a previously unknown freedom. It read:

American Gridiron: New England 32 Carolina 29

I was living as a missionary in Johannesburg and, for the first time in my life, I had missed the SuperBowl. And then it hit me. I hadn’t really missed anything. Some steroid-enhanced guys in tight, shiny pants ran around chasing a ball and someone was declared winner when a backwards clock read all zeroes.

(Sure is silly when you put it that way…)

But it was true. I hadn’t missed a thing.

I began to reconsider a lot of things in those days.

I began to consider the identity that I had built around other people’s ability. I began to consider how I had sought transcendence in overpaid laundry rather than eternal surety. And, living in Africa, I began to consider that I didn’t need sports at all…especially not to the level that I had previously submitted my life to them.

As a result, I largely gave up the day-to-day following of sports.

The beauty of the process was in the freedom it delivered. Rather than possessing a void where sports once stood, the fullness of the other aspects of life crashed into fill the vacuous space, leaving me with a greater satisfaction than ever before.

I still enjoy sports. I read a columnist or two regularly, as I love reading and I love good writing. I watch soccer every now and then, as it transports me back to Africa and back to a place where I feel connected with my faraway friends.

But it is nice not to be owned anymore. All because of one little line in an African newspaper.

American Gridiron: New England 32 Carolina 29

a question

What are you doing right now that will outlast you?

the lost city of z

Among the items occupying the Kindle screen these days is David Grann's fantastic book, The Lost City of Z.

A tale of Colonel Percy Fawcett's perilous journey into the unexplored Amazon in search of a mysterious lost city ('Z') is soon juxtaposed with the author's own fascination with both Fawcett and the Amazon. The author is overtaken with this obsession and chronicles for us his own pursuit of 'Z' and his recreation of Fawcett's legendary route.

Brain candy? Maybe. Great summer non-fiction? Definitely.

MLS in San Antonio: Gooooooooooooal

As part of my ongoing (read: completely worthless) efforts to bring the MLS to San Antonio, allow me to present the best goals from the 2008 MLS season. It is a long weekend, so this is my way of mailing it in. Until Tuesday...

If you are a subscriber and cannot see the video, click here...

a prayer from the depths

'In my distress I called to the LORD,
and he answered me.
From the depths of the grave I called for help,
and you listened to my cry.

You hurled me into the deep,
into the very heart of the seas,
and the currents swirled about me;
all your waves and breakers
swept over me.

I said, 'I have been banished
from your sight;
yet I will look again
toward your holy temple.'

The engulfing waters threatened me, the deep surrounded me;
seaweed was wrapped around my head.
To the roots of the mountains I sank down;
the earth beneath barred me in forever.
But you brought my life up from the pit,
O LORD my God.

When my life was ebbing away,
I remembered you, LORD,
and my prayer rose to you,
to your holy temple.

Those who cling to worthless idols
forfeit the grace that could be theirs.

But I, with a song of thanksgiving,
will sacrifice to you.
What I have vowed I will make good.
Salvation comes from the LORD.'

From the Book of Jonah