saintz08

Major League Soccer ends talks with San Antonio


SAN ANTONIO (AP) � Major League Soccer has pulled out of talks with San Antonio to locate a team in the city, saying local officials were not bargaining in good faith.

The Wednesday move came shortly after incoming mayor Phil Hardberger said at a news conference that the proposed deal with MLS didn't make financial sense for the city.

"Goodbye. That's what I would tell MLS," Hardberger said.

But MLS officials said goodbye first in a terse letter to outgoing Mayor Ed Garza, a strong proponent of bringing pro soccer to the Alamodome.

The letter, signed by MLS Commissioner Don Garber, said the work of Garza and league officials was undercut by politically driven criticisms that didn't take into consideration the benefits to the city.

"This has been changed at the 12th hour due to politics, and it is appalling," Garber later said in an interview with the San Antonio Express-News.

The letter said the criticisms impeded the effort to sell 5,000 season tickets or recruit local investors, two requirements MLS had set for granting a team in 2006.

Hardberger and several city council members criticized terms of the proposed deal, among them that the MLS team would get rent-free use of the dome.

Garza and MLS said an anchor tenant for the dome would help cut its operating costs and its annual deficit.

Garza questioned the abruptness of Hardberger's decision to end negotiations. Garza said the 10-member city council also should have some say in the matter.

"What are the alternatives?" Garza asked. "To continue to lose money (on the dome) or to try to find a major league sports tenant that creates opportunities to make money."

The Alamodome also is the stadium mentioned as a possible home for the NFL's Saints should the football team's owner, Tom Benson, decide to move his club to San Antonio from New Orleans, as Benson's lawyer has suggested he might. Officials have said the stadium would require hundreds of millions of dollars in renovations in order to meet NFL standards, however.

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/socce...o_x.htm?csp=34

So San Antonio has a population base of about 60 % hispanics and a soccer league would not work out , but an NFL team would in the backyard of one of the most popular NFL teams in the league with an established fan base ......

Pass the crack pipe on down the line ......:08:

\"Americans play to win at all times. I wouldn\'t give a hoot in hell for a man who lost and laughed.\" - George S. Patton
On another note, I\'ll take a bite of that crow 08. - Saintfan
Brooks is a moron!! - Halo