The Vancouver Whitecaps aren't having a great off-season. Between Bob Bradley snubs, Camilo fleeing and drafting a New York Cosmo, fans on the west coast can be forgiven for thinking that Toronto FC up and switched places with the Caps without telling anyone.
Taken individually, you can explain away any of issues. Put together, and added to the very loud whispers about dysfunction that are coming out of Vancouver, any thinking Caps fan has to be at least a little concerned about the direction of the club.
Smoke, fire and all that.But, no one in Vancouver wants to hear a guy from Toronto tell them that, even if that guy has a lot of experience identifying dysfunction in MLS teams.
So, we'll leave it at that for now.
Instead, we will focus on what Vancouver's misfortune means to the league and to the sport in North America. Specifically, how Camilo challenging the league's contracts and Andre Lewis challenging the draft could be the first public shots in the looming CBA war of 2015.[PRBREAK][/PRBREAK]
Keeping things Canadian, the ammunition for those shots is coming from the $100-million(ish) being spent in Toronto on Michael Bradley and Jermain Defoe. It's hard to hide behind the league's creative accounting -- which ignores Soccer United Marketing, expansion and stadium revenue -- Don Garber was using to claim a $75-million loss at the SuperDraft when T.O. is on a spending bender that would make Man City blush.
Some fans may struggle to see the connection between a CBA negotiation and the individual actions of a couple payers. However, the root of both Camilo and Lewis' moves is about gaining control. Both moves were also very likely done under the the advice of player agents, which underlines how they aren't just about the individual circumstances of the here and now.
In Camilo's case he was directly challenging unilateral club options (UCO), which, in the football world, are fairly unique. They are also almost certainly illegal in 95 percent of the football world.They might be legal in MLS because they were collectively bargained. It isn't in the scope of this article to conclude whether UCOs would stand up to a legal challenge--there is very likely enough there, there to make lawyers on both sides of the issue wealthy.
That said, to me, it's telling that MLS didn't file tampering charges against Queretaro (if he really was under contract, no question, Queretaro were clearly tampering) and instead just quietly and quickly negotiated a below market sale (in fairness, Queretaro also understood their side of the argument wasn't airtight, thus their willingness to pay anything).
MLS did not want to risk a challenge to UCOs so close to the CBA negotiations.
The reason? They might lose.
At the very least the player's side of the issue would get out and it might plant a seed into the minds of other MLS players to put UCOs on the table in the CBA negotiations.
That might have happened already. The truth is UCOs act as a drag on player salaries and act as a restrictor of player movement. They only exist because the players were convinced that they had to agree to them in 2010 in order to get a CBA agreement in place.
Fans understandably were upset with the "lack of loyalty" Camilo showed to the Caps, but the rest of the league's players were cheering him on. Don't be surprised if more Camilos happen if MLS doesn't bend on UCOs, which was likely a big part of the thinking behind his actions.
The Lewis situation is similar. The draft exists because it controls costs, both on entry level contracts and on development (it also exists because (North American sports fans have been exposed to them for so long that they have accepted as normal a practice that, in any other industry, would be fully absurd).
By forcing players to go through the draft it prevents bidding wars over top prospects. In turn, that keeps entry level contracts low (including contracts for academy grads, who are part of the same artificial market).
Parity is the price the league pays for the system that likely saves them millions. Yes, price. The league would rather big markets thrive, which is why they make rules up as they go along when it isn't league money being spent). Parity is spun to fans as being beneficial to them, when it really just creates mediocrity and ensured that more of the money they spend on tickets goes into the pockets of owners rather than back into the product they are paying for.
In the past, entry level players haven't had much leverage in MLS. They could try their luck in Europe, but college grads are generally too old to break in.
Now, the New York Cosmos represent the most aggressive and wealthy aspect of a league (NASL) that is approaching things differently than MLS does--they don't have the same North American quirks that MLS has, which might force MLS out of their comfort zone.
Although many fans won't give it much thought, if MLS pays a transfer fee to the Cosmos to cover up their screw up it will be a significant development. Prior to this year the league refused to treat the lower levels as equal partners in player transactions for fear it would legitimize those leagues as alternatives for North American prospects. They got away with it because the lower leagues couldn't match salaries. If that changes, and at least with the Cosmos it appears to be, then MLS is going to need to rethink the draft completely.
They would either need to sign every player prior to the draft (which they don't want to do because not every player makes it), or risk having to consistently pay a transfer fee to NASL teams that sign the top prospects.
NASL teams aren't restricted by the draft and would have the advantage of being able to approach the players the second their NCAA eligibility is no longer at issue.
Of course they could avoid this by scraping the draft altogether and getting serious about building academies. Right now, less than half the teams in the league are truly investing on the development side, with most content to leave development to the NCAA. Sure it's substandard and holds the game back in North America, but it's free!
Regardless, there will be plenty of time to debate the nuance of these issues this year as the CBA fight is only going to get nastier the closer we get to the 2015 deadline.