Against all odds, Major League Soccer is currently expanding faster than the universe.
(At the moment, the only things expanding faster than MLS are ride-sharing apps and, of course, Chipotle.)
Our own wondrous United States of America once widened across the continent. Apparently, MLS now has its own Manifest Destiny.
Okay, first let's briefly review the major professional sports leagues in our land - and, as a courtesy, we will include the NHL - in terms of number of franchises:
NFL - 32 teams; NBA - 30; MLB - 30; NHL - 30*; MLS - 20.
(*This will become 31 with Las Vegas joining the NHL in 2017-18; in 10 years, every league will be in Sin City, with keno concessionaires working the stands.)
So MLS is behind, but it's the baby of the group, born in 1996.
And look how far and fast it has come: From 10 teams in 2004, MLS now has 20; it will expand to 24 teams by 2018 and to 28 teams likely by 2020.
Wow. The sport of the '70s - that would be the 1970s, folks - is finally hitting its stride!
In actuality, the other, older major sports leagues are still in expansion mode, too.
MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred recently mentioned that baseball is looking to add two more franchises in the near future.
The NBA and the NFL even have been probing the international market for a while.
(Before retiring, NBA czar David Stern's last internal memo read, "We must be in Prague by dawn." Meanwhile, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has been eying London as a team site for years and, after that, it's only logical the NFL eventually will seek a franchise in Vatican City.)
On the other hand, I have proposed to the NHL Board of Governors that the league contract to its original six teams, a move opposed by NBCSN, which would lose 83 percent of its live domestic programming.
MLS Commissioner Don Garber has indicated he wants to fill in the geographical gaps underserved soccer-wise; there is a dearth of MLS teams in the Midwest and Southeast, a void nicely filled at the moment by Cracker Barrel restaurants.
The next wave of MLS expansion will include Atlanta, Miami, Minneapolis-St. Paul and bring back a second team to Los Angeles to join the Galaxy, to replace disbanded Chivas USA.
(L.A. has to have two of everything. Why? Well, the area is so far-flung and traffic-clogged, when you just have one of something, it takes most of us an hour-and-a-half to get there. So when you add a second option elsewhere, it cuts the drive to 45 minutes.)
Incidentally, this sport is so expansion-hot, if L.A. gets a third MLS franchise, I suspect it will be the Beverly Hills Kardashians FC.
When MLS expands to 28 teams, Sacramento and St. Louis are front-runners, with Detroit, San Antonio, Austin, Charlotte, Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Phoenix and San Diego also in the mix.
San Diego? Really?
I love San Diego and, as many of you know, I don't necessarily love MLS. So on my list of "103 Things to Do in San Diego" - and No. 102 is to call friends back East and tell them, "Man, you can't believe how good the weather is here" - No. 103 would be to attend an MLS game.
Naturally, all this expansion will involve construction of new playing facilities. Speaking of which, every time I hear the term "soccer-specific stadium," for some reason I think "vegan-specific supermarket."
Anyway, as MLS continues to grow, Couch Slouch has a couple of avant-garde ideas:
Expand to Guantanamo Bay. Replace the detention camp with a soccer-specific stadium, or, better yet, keep the prison camp and open a stadium adjacent to the barracks - you have a built-in captive audience! Frankly, you would serve a double constituency here with disparate needs: Some inmates might be rabid soccer fans and others would be tortured by MLS games.
Think outside the bun. You know how you often see Taco Bell and KFC under the same roof? I'd combine MLS with DMV. This would allow some of us to take care of two things at once that we dread to do - watch an MLS game and renew our driver's license.
Q. If, as French composer Claude Debussy once said, "The music is not in the notes, but in the silence between the notes," can we not also say, "The race is not in the runners, but in the spaces between the runners?" (Greg Hanrahan; Williamsburg, Va.)
A. Boy, you just knocked me halfway to Kierkegaard.
Q. Your Tennessee football column might've been the stupidest thing I've read. Would you rank it as the worst and laziest you've ever written? (John Myers; Columbia, S.C.)
A. Still checking - I've been writing these babies for an unbearably long time - but we've already found 27 worse, lazier columns than that one.
Q. When soccer teams play a "friendly," it is described as a demonstration without consequence and not part of a real competition. Do you think the Braves and Reds should consider the rest of their games as a "friendly"? (Jeff Dent; South Charleston)
A. Pay the man, Shirley.
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