Major League Soccer is coming to Atlanta – Finally, or Folly?
Kevin Liles-USA TODAY Sports
It’s now official – Major League Soccer has announced that they have reached an agreement with Atlanta Falcons owner Arthur Blank to award a franchise to the city of Atlanta.
Yes, soccer will be back in Atlanta in 2017, but the idea of Atlanta becoming the home of the 22nd MLS franchise has sparked a debate within the city, and even by fans outside the ATL.
So is Atlanta — the city what was once hung with the sobriquet of “Losersville, U.S.A.” by Sports Illustrated — ready to be the home of yet another professional sports franchise, when the perception is that fans in the South’s capital city have a difficult enough time giving their unfettered support to the three teams currently residing there.
There is no debating the ultimate popularity of soccer (for purposes of this article, we will refer to the sport as soccer, since it’s contained in the name of the league), or the growing fervor that surrounds MLS. Soccer is truly an international sport whose loyalties and deliriously zealous fans can hardly be matched in any sport or league.
There are a wealth of statistics that point to a professional soccer franchise in Atlanta being just as successful, if not more, than in some of the league’s other markets. But perhaps this is a case where a true evaluation has to be done with the eyeball rather than with the numbers.
MILLENIALS TO THE RESCUE?
One of the big reasons that Atlanta was awarded this franchise is due to the diverse and international nature of the city’s population. Not only does Atlanta boast a large segment of it’s populous coming from other cities within the U.S., but they also have a tremendous melting pot of multinational communities mixed throughout the metro area.
The age segmentation in Atlanta is just as diverse as the cultural ones, as seen in the graphic below from data compiled by the US Census Bureau in 2010:
Those statistics point to a huge segment of Atlanta’s population falling directly into the demographic that has helped drive MLS popularity nationwide – the Millenials, ranging in age from early 20’s to late 30’s.
But does that age group behave the same in Atlanta as in other cities, and is the love and desire for a soccer team really there? I went out on the streets in midtown and downtown Atlanta and randomly surveyed 150 people. I asked questions ranging from whether or not they knew Atlanta was getting an MLS team, if they would be season ticket holders or regular attendees, and if they couldn’t attend would they watch on television.
Obviously this is a small sampling, and is hardly scientific, but the results were very revealing.
The one thing I noticed while speaking to people was a lot of indifference and waffling about watching or supporting the team in person.
THE PAPER TEST vs. THE EYEBALL TEST
So on paper, everything points to a yes for MLS being a success in Atlanta. The reasons to look at this as a winning proposition are almost overwhelming.
Atlanta is a temperate, southern climate, conducive to soccer. There is a very large youth soccer contingency with leagues all over the suburban areas of Metro Atlanta. The proximity to other states such as South Carolina, North Carolina and Alabama — who also are soccer hotbed states — could mean not only support for an Atlanta team, but future expansion of the league.
Atlanta is the largest U.S. city (in terms of population) without an MLS franchise.
Arthur Blank has a lot of hopes and money tied up in this undertaking, and he almost never gives up on an investment (look how much money and lavish attention he dumped into Michael Vick).
It all points to a this-can’t-fail type proposition.
But when you give the overall situation the eyeball test, you may come to a much different conclusion.
This is Atlanta – a city that isn’t exactly known for giving tremendous support to their teams. Even with consistently winning teams, fans have to be coaxed to attend games and become involved with the franchise.
Soccer has come and gone before here, and yes it was decades ago, but ultimately that has to be considered. Ted Turner — whose golden touch is just as good if not better than Blank’s — couldn’t even make soccer take off in a city where the sport ruled the Atlanta youth circuit in the early 1980s, drawing a paltry average of only 6,141 per game.
While the population of the city has grown and become more diverse, the general feeling of disinterest in sports still permeates throughout the downtown sector. And drawing suburbanites to a downtown destination for soccer games will be more difficult than many may think.
Traffic, construction and expensive parking are all factors that deter suburban fans from coming downtown for any event, less yet a soccer match.
WORST CASE ISN’T COMPLETE FAILURE
So what is the worst that could happen for Atlanta and Arthur Blank? Believe it or not, having the team ultimately fail and fold (or move to Canada – isn’t that were all floundering Atlanta teams go?) isn’t the worse that could happen.
Having the team fold or move would be a blow, but would eventually become part of the past, only to be relived again when Atlanta is mentioned in the same breath with a new franchise for any league. Nationally, Atlanta would be trolled and given the cyber-raspberry, and then all would become quiet.
But what if the MLS team doesn’t cease operation or pack up the trucks and leave, but just kind of….well…is. Like the Atlanta Hawks. Like so many other teams in Atlanta’s sports history.
If the Atlanta MLS franchise just becomes another run-of-the-mill middling and meager team who has some postseason appearances but never becomes a championship organization, it would only help to cement the moniker of “Losersville” that was hung on the city that didn’t seem to care oh so many years ago.
And the Rob Parkers and Jason Whitlocks of the media world would have a field day.
In the end, there probably will be no middle ground with this new team. Either a Major League Soccer team will flourish and become one of the model franchises in the league, or will be a disastrous failure.
Atlantans should do more than hope for the former – they should remove their duffs from the sofa, and become involved with this team, or watch the city become nothing more than folly in the soccer world.