(This article originally appeared at Some Canadian Guys Writing About Soccer on March 20, 2009. Wondering what this is? Click here.)
Television funnyman Drew Carey hasn’t shied away from controversy during his time as minority stakeholder in the Seattle Sounders FC, which played its first game in Major League Soccer on Thursday night, an impressive 3-0 win over New York.
But Carey’s newest suggestion is his boldest yet: offering the entire franchise itself as a prize on the long-running game show The Price is Right, which Carey currently hosts.
“I think an MLS franchise would make a great prize in a Showcase Showdown one of these days,” said Carey. “And it would be just like any other prize: try to guess the correct value, without going over… I don’t think Don Garber would be allowed to play.”
[PRBREAK][/PRBREAK]
This suggestion comes mere days after Carey’s plan to allow Sounders fans to have a direct influence on head-office decisions, such as the hiring and firing of the general manager.
“Look, it’s not that different from an episode of my old show, where Oswald meets the owner of the [Cleveland] Browns down at the Warsaw, and after the guy couldn’t handle his Buzz [beer], he sells the team to Oswald. You remember that one, don’t you?”
When contacted, producers of The Drew Carey Show confirmed that such an episode was never aired, taped or even discussed.
The addition of a pro sports franchise into the mix on The Price is Right would mark a surprising new direction for the program, which has aired for over 50 years and is largely based upon over-enthusiastic college students and adorable old ladies with hand-made T-shirts guessing at the prices of inexpensive everyday items such as tomato sauce and wart removal cream. By contrast, the price for a team wishing to enter the MLS is currently set at $40 mil-- err, $35 million.
“Look,” said Carey, “you don’t get anywhere if you don’t take risks. Do you think I’d be where I was today if I hadn’t let Ryan Stiles make all those fat jokes at my expense on Whose Line? Or if I hadn’t entered the WWE Royal Rumble, fulfilling my lifelong dream of making a fool of myself in front of thousands of drunken hillbillies?
“Maybe some people don’t like what I’m doing with the Sounders, but like I said, sometimes you have to take risks to get where you want to go.”
Carey then sighed loudly and stared at the ceiling for several moments.
“Do you think Craig Ferguson is still hiring?”