2014 Canadian MLS Team Total Salaries Compared to CFL Salaries, Toronto FC Way on Top

Roger Pielke Jr has an excellent article looking at MLS team total salaries.

Probably the most interesting thing, especially if you're Canadian, is that Toronto FC's total salary is way higher than any other MLS team at $16.7 million (all figures in US dollars), with the next team, LA Galaxy at $13.2 million. Whether the $16.7 million for TFC includes transfer fees (which were enormous this year to land Jermaine Dafoe) seems unlikely. Obviously we know now that Toronto FC still managed to miss the playoffs, even with this massive expenditure relative to other teams.

I'm not a soccer guy at all, but I did predict spending a lot of money to bring in a crotchety striker like Dafoe wasn't a good idea, and what was hyped with endless ads as a "Bloody Big Deal" has basically turned out to be a debacle.

TFC's salary bill is also way more than the other two Canadian teams. The Montreal Impact's salary bill was $6.6 million, while the Vancouver Whitecaps was only $5.2 million. Amusingly, only the Whitecaps made the playoffs.

Note that all three MLS Canadian teams had salaries above the salary cap in the CFL this year, which was $5 million Canadian. Which is only around $4.4 million now in US dollar terms.

Obviously TFC had to lose money this year, the only question is how much.

CFL Week 5 TSN Television Ratings; Toronto FC's Television Rankings Suck

Yahoo's Chris Zelkovich has all the television rankings for the weekend for Canadian sports programs (which I'm sure are dwarfed by the Bachelorette's, but what are you going to do).

Once again the three CFL games are on top, although the Yankees Jays games weren't bad.

1. CFL, Bombers at Lions, Friday, TSN: 857,000
2. CFL, Argonauts at Roughriders, Saturday, TSN: 830,000
3. CFL, RedBlacks at Tiger-Cats, Saturday, TSN: 670,000

The CFL games on average were higher than last weeks (and also above last year's average) although sadly the  Ottawa Hamilton game's had the lowest rankings. I'm not sure if Ottawa being a new team should help or hinder their rankings. Nonetheless those big numbers for Western based teams probably means good value for the money for Humpty's and Wendy's. Too bad Hamilton basically has neither.

Zelkovich also reported this nugget:

"DOG OF THE WEEK: Saturday's MLS game between Toronto FC and Sporting Kansas City drew a paltry 22,000 viewers to TSN2. Even by TFC's low standards for television, that's alarmingly low considering how much MLSE has invested in this team. It truly is a bizarre situation, with the team selling out its stadium but unable to attract flies to its TV product.
If anyone was hoping for a bump in interest after the World Cup, it obviously didn't happen. A Vancouver Whitecaps game on Sunday did better on the main TSN channel, but still failed to crack the 100,000 mark.
The answer: maybe the only ones who care are the 20,000 who show up at BMO Field."

Ouch. Considering all the money MLSE has spent on TFC transfer fees this season, that's not good for profits as this team needs TV money because just relying on the gate won't cut it. As a Bell shareholder which owns a part of MLSE, let's just say I'm disappointed. 

538 Post With CFL Data on Combined With Other North American Sports

Nate Silver's new incarnation has an interesting blog post on the relative internet popularity of North American pro sports that includes both CFL teams and Mexican soccer teams. Obviously I like that they included CFL teams, but I thought including Mexican soccer was interesting as well.

The stats show Google trend data from 2004-2014. Unsurprisingly the Saskatchewan Rough Riders are the most popular of the CFL teams on the internet with a score of 0.27. That's almost as popular as the least popular NBA team, the recently sold Milwaukee Bucks and tied with the St. Louis Blues (admittedly over the past ten years the Blues haven't been a great team in the past decade). They're also more popular than the NHL's Ducks, Lightning, Hurricanes, Coyotes, Predators, Panthers and Blue Jackets. They're way behind Guadalajara of La Liga Mexico. There's two teams in the MLS more popular than the Riders. Toronto FC and the Edmonton Eskimos were tied at 0.23, which was still more popular than five NHL teams.

Unfortunately for the Ticats, they were last in the time period at 0.11 but they were still ahead of 11 MLS teams. In the Ticats defence, the 2004 to 2014 time period was quite poor in terms of wins. That also pretty much coincides with Bob Young's ownership tenure.

After Edmonton, the next more popular teams were the Lions, the Alouettes (who no doubt have had their popularity on Google trends spiked this week by trying out and signing Chad Johnson (who also has a lot of Twitter followers) to a two year contract), the Bombers, the Stampeders and then the Argos at 0.13.

Hopefully with the Ticats' recent success last year the Cats Google trend popularity will increase (although probably matter much revenue wise). Interestingly for Toronto FC, there's a lot of relative internet interest that doesn't convert into much in terms in of Canadian television ratings. However the CFL has the advantage that for each game two Canadian teams are always playing, whereas the Canadian MLS teams are often playing teams like the Columbus Crew who surely don't have a lot of Canadian fans.

Toronto Lynx Not Coming to Hamilton, Ticats Cited

Looks like the plan for the Toronto Lynx to play at Tim Horton's field won't happen. When I first heard it, it seemed a little strange as Ticat owner Bob Young had talked about a soccer team of his own in Hamilton.

From the CBC article:

"But the Lynx had competition from the Ticats organization, which has been negotiating with the city for a pro soccer partnership. The city and Ticats organization are looking for the highest possible level of soccer to be played at the stadium and the USL Pro League is at least a third tier league. City staff recommended against a deal with the Lynx."

I haven't heard much about the Ticats' plans for a soccer team lately, but evidently they are still pursuing it. Bob Young had owned (until 2010) a part of the Carolina Railhawks, now in the North American Soccer League (the second tier league), along with Canadian teams FC Edmonton and the Ottawa Fury.

If Bob Young can get a NASL team, that's obviously better for the city than a third tier team especially one that's just a farm team of Toronto FC.

Toronto Argonauts Must Move From Roger's Centre By 2018

Here's the definitive Globe and Mail article on the subject. The Blue Jays want to install natural grass in the Dome and that precludes the Argos from playing there. I assume that for Grey Cups, the grass is removed at the end of the baseball season and thus Grey Cups in November can be played there.

So the Argos have to find a new home. MLSE has already mulled buying them and having them play at BMO Field. The Argos could play their potentially 11 games a year there on the natural turf without too much damage (rugby is already played on it), however MLSE could put back in artificial turf. That could make CFL haters the Red Patch Boys and former Toronto mayor David Miller* crazy, however Toronto FC has sucked its entire existence, but with and without grass. As I already mentioned in another post, having the Argos play at BMO on national television would boost the value of the naming rights.

Potentially the Argos could try an ultra cheap bare bones stadium somewhere or other. Really the Argos need a small stadium around 20,000 seats they can fill and the CFL needs the television money. People will watch the Argos on television but they won't watch TFC. Maybe the Argos could partner with the rugby and cricket folks for a stadium.

One thing to consider with television is that the CFL needs the Argos. They may be willing to fund $5 million per year over 20 years to help with a new stadium. Perhaps the Argos could partner with a developer and have some condo towers integrated with the stadium and get some money that way. This issue will probably simmer for a few years and then heat up.

*At least current Toronto Rob Ford is a CFL supporter, even showing up at a game in Saskatchewan.

What is Tim Horton's Paying for Naming Rights For the New Ticats Stadium? 2015 Grey Cup in Hamilton?

I'm curious what Tim Horton's is paying for naming rights for the new stadium. I found this article from CHML's Ted Michaels, with the following info:

"While the actual total of the agreement was not publicized, sources tell Inside the CFL that the naming rights were purchased for between $10 million and $15 million." 

The article says it is a ten year deal, so the price is between $ 1 million and 1.5 million per year. That's significantly less than the $2.7 million per year that BMO paid for BMO Field in Toronto, which I discussed in this earlier post.

From that post "Obviously there's a lot of visibility on the Gardner Expressway from cars, but Toronto FC games currently receive miniscule television ratings compared to CFL games and usually the games involve an American opponent. For Scotiabank Place, the arena of the Ottawa Senators, Scotiabank paid $21 million over 15 years. Is $10 million over 10 years possible for a rebuilt stadium?"

Interesting that the Cats could be getting more money than the Senators stadium. I do wonder what the new price for BMO stadium will be when the contract comes up again. As I said, high value for the location, but not a lot of television visibility.

The Ticats will eventually host the Grey Cup at their stadium, sooner than later and perhaps as early as 2015 (mentioned in this 2010 article from Perry Lefko). That has to have some real monetary value for Tim Horton's, as does the potential that the Cats could host it again before the ten year deal is up (perhaps Grey Cup 2023). Of course Hamilton last hosted the Grey Cup in 1996 and 1972 before that and the 1996 wasn't particularly successful. The new modern Grey Cup is usually sold out now independent of the city, so Hamilton hosting it again shouldn't be a problem (and with Bob Young's marketing muscle it could be impressive).

The question is how many temporary fans can be shoehorned in to watch the game. I've never really gotten a firm number on that, however one assumes that in the design that is accounted for. We'll see.