How will the new Thorns owners affect the academy and girls' soccer?

[Guest]

According to the news report, the new training center is expected to be open next calendar year, the Thorns will be able to train for free at Prov Park in the meantime, and there has been no announcement of where it will be located.

If an organization has money, building a soccer training facility doesn't take three years. For nonprofit youth clubs, yeah, things can take that long.

Do they have money, they just spent 63 million on a team in a failing league. They might be the next homeless population in Portland

[Guest]

Do they have money, they just spent 63 million on a team in a failing league. They might be the next homeless population in Portland

They got BUCKETS of money. If they can afford to pay $63 million for a women's soccer team, I'm pretty sure they can afford the expenses of running it.

And NWSL is expanding, not failing. Women's soccer is becoming a thing. If there's any threat to the NWSL is that the top tier European pro leagues (the Premier League, La Liga), where the respective football governing bodies have essentially imposed the equivalent of Title IX at the professional level (i.e. all pro clubs must run women's teams too), may surpass NWSL, if they haven't already.

But keep cheering for the local women's pro team to fail, so the youth club that your daughter plays for (or which you work for) might get some player upgrades if pro team's affiliated youth academy ceases operations.

[Guest]

Do they have money, they just spent 63 million on a team in a failing league. They might be the next homeless population in Portland

Such a dumb post! The new owners of the Thorns are also owners of the Sacramento Kings, you know the team that plays in the NBA. That franchise is currently valued at 3.33 BILLION dollars. Let me help you with some math. $63 million is roughly 2% of the value of the Kings. The Thorns are going to be just fine from a financial perspective.

[Guest]

Such a dumb post! The new owners of the Thorns are also owners of the Sacramento Kings, you know the team that plays in the NBA. That franchise is currently valued at 3.33 BILLION dollars. Let me help you with some math. $63 million is roughly 2% of the value of the Kings. The Thorns are going to be just fine from a financial perspective.

Merrit never sold off all of his shares. He still has ownership as well.

The club is worth much more than 65 million.

Same crap will continue. Mediocrity continues for their youth sports.

[Guest]

Throws aside most of the NWSL are struggling to pay their bills. Attendance is pretty slim. They're not going to start a free academy system when what is there works for them, for free. With only 11 teams running their own league is geographically impossible. MLS can't do it and there's 3x as many pro clubs. They have to include pay to plays for it to work.

There will be more players like OM, especially now that each NWSL clubs can sign up 4 players like her, all without running costly academy teams. The vast majority of players won't pay out for clubs

[Guest]

Thorns.

[Guest]

Brutal year for women's soccer. US National Team is a dumpster fire for the next 4 years, NWSL is on life support, and the leagues biggest supporter just sold his team. That and title nine is in real jeopardy.

[Guest]

Brutal year for women's soccer. US National Team is a dumpster fire for the next 4 years, NWSL is on life support, and the leagues biggest supporter just sold his team. That and title nine is in real jeopardy.

"League's biggest supporter".

LOL.

[Guest]

Believe me MP was a main driver is the league making it this far. He had a lot of reasons to see it be successful.

[Guest]

Why do people keep thinking that the Thorns Academy is part of the Thorns pro team? It is not. It is just the name. They have zero affiliation with the Pro side, other than Paulson has 2 kids that play there.

They used to be part of the Pro team with the DA system, but that was dissolved in 2020 and ever since has been its own entity.

Thorns Academy has merged 3 different times now with local clubs to try and stay financially solvent. Eventually it will crash because they do not have enough players to generate revenue needed to pay all the staff and travel etc..

If they were only as smart as the grifters that have thousands of rec players (dues) in their club to subsidize their travel and stay financially solvent.

Tricky tricky.

[Guest]

If they were only as smart as the grifters that have thousands of rec players (dues) in their club to subsidize their travel and stay financially solvent.

Tricky tricky.

I'm pretty sure NWE doesn't have any rec players (being a competitive club), and even if one is insulting the B and C teams by calling them "rec", NWE doesn't have thousands of players. Maybe one thousand--if you have three teams at each age level in both genders, that's around 1000 players, and I'm sure NWE isn't that big.

A professional team will have a far easier time operating a subsidized academy than a nonprofit youth club. The only youth club in the Pacific Northwest that operates subsidized academy teams (ignoring need-based scholarships for lower-income players) is Crossfire Premier, and they're huge; larger than anything in Oregon, and certainly larger than NWE.

[Guest]

What is the proposed location for this new training facility?

[Guest]

Its a fairy tale dream at this point. Reality is Delta Park for the time being

[Guest]

I'm pretty sure NWE doesn't have any rec players (being a competitive club), and even if one is insulting the B and C teams by calling them "rec", NWE doesn't have thousands of players. Maybe one thousand--if you have three teams at each age level in both genders, that's around 1000 players, and I'm sure NWE isn't that big.

A professional team will have a far easier time operating a subsidized academy than a nonprofit youth club. The only youth club in the Pacific Northwest that operates subsidized academy teams (ignoring need-based scholarships for lower-income players) is Crossfire Premier, and they're huge; larger than anything in Oregon, and certainly larger than NWE.

To be a proper academy the club has to cover all costs, including expensive travel. Most clubs are operating on the slimmest of margins. A survey of MLS pro clubs showed self reported costs of $1.5M to over $3M. NWSL clubs simply can't afford that right now. MLS pro clubs are in the academy business because they're required to. They would prefer to train a small fraction of players but have to in order to be in MLSN. Most times what they get from the occasional home grown doesn't cover the costs. Right now NWSL can now sign up to 4 teens and develop them with the first team, which will prove far more beneficial to the player and club than being in the youth market. This will be what clubs do for the near term.

Also given how few clubs there are they have to work with another league to make it geographically feasible. Only a few clubs will give them quality games. This is an issue that plagues MLS pro clubs also.

[Guest]

Why do people keep thinking that the Thorns Academy is part of the Thorns pro team? It is not. It is just the name. They have zero affiliation with the Pro side, other than Paulson has 2 kids that play there.

They used to be part of the Pro team with the DA system, but that was dissolved in 2020 and ever since has been its own entity.

Thorns Academy has merged 3 different times now with local clubs to try and stay financially solvent. Eventually it will crash because they do not have enough players to generate revenue needed to pay all the staff and travel etc..

If the Academy has no affiliation with the Pro team, why were Academy players on the stage of the Press Conference with the new owners, and sitting among the Pro players in the first row of the audience?