by Roderick MacNeil
Rendering of the soccer configuration for the new Atlanta stadium.
That gaping hole in Major League Soccer’s franchise map is being rapidly filled. (Note: Pun about the stadium rendering above not intended.)
For more than a decade, the league hasn’t had a club south of Washington, DC and east of Texas. That changes in 2015 when Orlando City SC joins, marking MLS’s return to Florida for the first time since the contraction of the Tampa Bay Mutiny and Miami Fusion in 2002. David Beckham’s investment group is working to secure a stadium in Miami for a team that will join at a date yet to be determined, creating a brand new rivalry in the Sunshine State.
But now for the first time in the league’s near-twenty-year history, it looks as if there will also be a club located in the “Capital of the South.”
A report Saturday from Philly.com claims that the much-rumored Atlanta MLS expansion franchise will be officially awarded as early as April 16. The author indicates that several sources have confirmed an announcement is imminent, and that final details are being worked out.
The new club’s principal owner will be Arthur Blank, current owner of the NFL’s Atlanta Falcons and founder of Home Depot. The MLS club and the Falcons would share a new downtown stadium due to open in 2017. The facility will have a retractable roof and an artificial playing surface, and is being designed to accommodate both NFL football and professional soccer.
Major League Soccer’s approval of such a stadium arrangement is further proof of how the league’s philosophy on stadiums has evolved. In recent years, the primary emphasis was on creating “soccer specific” facilities controlled by the clubs. The current trend has shifted to prioritizing location, and more precisely, urban locations with access to public transit.
MLS is betting that this shared facility arrangement with an NFL team will work out more like the one in Seattle than the one New England. Time will tell.
With the league’s announced expansion to 24 teams by 2020, all but one franchise has already been spoken for. The race is on for that final spot, with Minneapolis and San Antonio believed to be the leading candidates. However, given the ever-growing list of interested cities and ownership groups, Major League Soccer may very well blow straight past number 24. The other four “major” sports leagues have settled in at 30-32 teams each. It seems more probable that MLS keep growing to a similar size.
Or perhaps beyond.
The Near Post 