Soccer is growing fast in the United States and the 'best days are still ahead' for MLS

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Soccer is growing fast in the United States and the 'best days are still ahead' for MLS
By Jamie Goldberg | The Oregonian/OregonLive

on August 28, 2016 at 9:36 AM, updated August 28, 2016 at 1:25 PM

In November of 2001, Major League Soccer owner Lamar Hunt and his two sons, Dan and Clark, sat around a table inside Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City listening intently on a conference call as other owners talked ominously about the state of their fledging league.

MLS had lost $250 million since its inception in 1996. Two of the league's 12 franchises were in such sorry shape that they would need to fold.

By the end of the discouraging 15-minute conference call, the majority of the owners were in agreement: It was time to call the bankruptcy lawyers. The MLS experiment had failed.

Over the next 48 hours, Hunt called each owner to convince them to give the league another shot. Ultimately, three owners – Hunt, Philip Anschutz and Robert Kraft – shelled out the necessary money to take over the remaining 10 teams and keep MLS afloat.