MLS Fines DC President $5k for Pointing Out The Obvious
There are a few things that have been detrimental to the image of MLS this week, including Alexi Lalas’ face appearing every time I open the MLS homepage. High on my list would have been MLS moving the Fire’s away playoff game at New England to Sunday from Saturday, just two days after they had scheduled it for the original date in the first place. Apparently someone at MLS head office went to Walgreens and figured out what all the scary looking decorations they were selling were for.
I digress, but only because rarely do we see MLS worry about its image when it comes to accommodating supporters who already had travel plans for a game a few days away. Instead, it busies itself handing out an absurd fine to DC President Kevin Payne, who a few days ago made some petty but fairly truthful comments about the play of certain MLS teams to Soccer Insider:
You look at the way Real Salt Lake played when they came here [a 0-0 tie in May] and sat 10 guys behind the ball. You don’t have to do that. Sometimes that is the best way to get a result — if you don’t care about the product, if you don’t care about advertising your league. Long term, who wants to watch that?
Now, as we commented, Payne’s comments were a rather poor effort at covering his own backside for a team incapable of playing good football and winning this season. But certainly, even a hardcore MLS supporter and Direct Kick subscriber like myself has trouble finding the motivation to track down a San Jose-Colorado game in July even when my television is starved of the beautiful game.
A couple of days passed and MLS sent out a press release saying “Major League Soccer Commissioner Don Garber today fined D.C. United President Kevin Payne $5,000 for public comments deemed detrimental to the public image of the League.
I don’t particularly feel sorry for Payne being knocked down a peg, but it’s typical of MLS to waste time worrying about how the league appears instead of working on improving what it actually is.
Update: maybe it was worth MLS doing this, just to see Kevin Payne eat humble pie.
I deeply regret some of the comments I made in an interview published earlier this week. In trying to explain the, sometimes, unfair expectations on the Head Coach of D.C. United, I made critical comments of Colorado, New England, Real Salt Lake and the League. Those comments were unprofessional. I have great personal regards and professional respect for my colleagues at those organizations and for their ownership and fans. I have apologized to those teams and individuals privately and now do so publicly
About the Author
Tom Dunmore is the founder and editor of Pitch Invasion. Follow him @pitchinvasion on Twitter.
Email this author | All posts by Tom Dunmore
You might also like:
|
|
|
|
|
Meh, $5,000 is a very, very small amount, I don’t think it’s an unreasonable amount to ding a front office guy for trashing the league. And yeah, I think a fine is karmic justice for him to make those comments after all the time I wasted tuning in and thinking DCU would finally get their act together in the CONCACAF Champions League. Talk about hours I’ll never get back.
And Tom, that’s rich of you to complain about MLS making you see Alexi’s face everywhere, when you’ve chosen him as your Twitter avatar and subject your tweeps to it like 5 times a day!
(I was actually gonna mention this on FF, but it’s actually my favorite avatar on Twitter, no joke.)
True enough, it’s hard to shed a tear for dear old Kevin. Glad someone picked up on the Lalas hypocrisy! I get a lot of questions, praise and complaints about that avatar, but it was perhaps the great moment in televised American soccer history, in my opinion.
Why is this a fine and when Seattle basically trashed the whole DC organization and fanbase we didn’t see a similar reaction. I call shenanigans.
(Honest Question)
Did Seattle make any direct comments like Payne did? If not then…well that’s your answer.
The fact that Payne got fined $5,000 means that MLS equates Payne’s comments with David Beckham’s challenge of a fan to enter the field during halftime of the Galaxy-Milan friendly. That equation, in itself, is ridiculous and asinine. What Beckham did was far more damaging to the image of the league.
Besides, Garber did NOTHING when Cuauhtemoc Blanco clocked a couple of people (including a security guard) during the U.S. Open Cup game against United — which was far worse than what either Beckham or Payne did. Yes, it was an Open Cup game, not an MLS game, but that’s merely a convenient excuse for Garber to sit on his hands. The last time I checked, both the Fire and United are league members.
Schram, Payne did not trash the league. He made some critical comments, the same that both many fans and detractors make. If MLS insulates itself with yes-men, doesn’t acknowledge opposition (draw them in) it won’t improve as fast as it can.
So they disagree. Then that’s a good media opportunity for MLS to make a statement explaining its issues, success, and direction. Controversy launches media. A skilled PR staff can put a positive spin on it and benefit from the controversy itself.
Payne specifically named names in his tirade – thus the fine. Unfortunately for all involved, he spoke the truth, and so when MLS fines him, it looks punitive and a bit petulant.