The longer the sale drags on, the less time the new owners have to retool the team and hire staff. I doubt Mike Norris will be retained. He was a convenient fill-the-vacancy-immediately hire, and who from the outside would seek the job knowing the team was being sold? As for Karina LeBlanc, who knows what constraints she might be working…
The longer the sale drags on, the less time the new owners have to retool the team and hire staff. I doubt Mike Norris will be retained. He was a convenient fill-the-vacancy-immediately hire, and who from the outside would seek the job knowing the team was being sold? As for Karina LeBlanc, who knows what constraints she might be working under and whether she will stay on. Paulson isn't going to invest heavily in the team if he indeed will sell it.
There's radio silence and there's motoring twenty miles off the coast and dropping the radio into the Pacific. I'm baffled at the lack of meaningful communication.
Agree. The front office was never highly communicative but became much more tight-lipped because of the scandals. Which was exactly the opposite of what it should have done.
I'm thinking perhaps there should be a coordinated effort -- NOT led by the RCRs, so it is not so easily compartmentalized and swept away, but certainly from a wide swath of Thorns fans -- to contact Heather Davis and Jessica Berman maybe once a week now, to request updates on the status of the Thorns sale.
I'm also thinking perhaps anybody who has media credentials should be asking this question just as frequently.
It's been 7 months now. Time for an update and some transparency.
The next NWSL (or- sorry, Phoecerman and others on here- PTFC) media person who asks hard substantive questions of the team and league will be the first. Not even Meg Linehan, despite her great work. It seems from what i've seen/read that Jeff Kassouf comes to closest to daring to being wished into the cornfield.
I was surprised no one asked Norris about the lack of NTRP's in the post-match presser. Having 3 actual midfielders, only 1 (maybe 2) of whom are 90 mins fit and then trying to shoehorn random players in to cover? Poor. Would've liked to hear an answer, though to be fair, Norris can only do so much there if KK isn't doing her job.
Re: the sale...Paulson will benefit from all media being distracted by and a part of the WC media circus. Which, of course is a good thing...but Paulson will still benefit from having larger media folks distracted. Would love direct questions, even if it's to the coach, so other folks will start to feel pressure. We have 3 clubs for sale, 2 of whom have been for sale for 7 months now, and one of whom is thee premiere club of the last decade....why is no one talking about this?
Announcement was Nov. 1st, wasn't it? Maybe I'm off by a month. Either way, I wish NWSL would put some pressure on as well, but they've said "no rush on the sale while we find some worthy hands." Just could be the undoing of a decade of work building up this club and roster while everything currently is being neglected, whether due to incompetence or tied hands.
Can some local reporters dig more into this? If the club won't speak about it, maybe contact the league? Any pressure would be nice! We don't even know if anyone is interested at this point.
It would be such a miss to not be able to capitalize on the World Cup for a new owner, especially because the star looking to carry the USA is the star of this club. So many eyeballs, they could be selling so much merch, making splashy announcements, ect....just, there's been nothing. KC has KCxUSA merch available and they don't even have one damn player on the US team! They also have a bunch of merch for the rest of their internationals. We just do literally nothing. Nothing was done for Pride, nothing for Juneteenth, nothing for AAPI month, women's history month, black history month....they did the bare minimum (which I think was more just the league.) Bare minimum for Pride- rainbow numbers. Bare minimum for Juneteenth- players wore tshirts and someone sang "Lift Every Voice and Sing" (which again, the league had every club do.) The club itself doesn't deserve the fans here honestly, it's done nothing to earn the respect of this community in recent years. I'd rather continue on with a new shitty owner (if that's the case), than carry on tethered to Merritt Paulson while he profits until someone meets his demands....it's so utterly frustrating to me.
But, yes, we're now into our 8th month of this water-treading.
And, honestly, it asks a helluva lot of the fans and the players, both of whom have been doing their best, to show up.
Attendance is up, merch and concessions sales are presumably strong, the crowds are loud, etc.
The team should be doing better than they are, but at least they are in 2nd in a 12-team league with just about 1/3rd of the season to go..
One could easily almost forget that the owner promised to sell the team because now was the time and it was in everybody's best interests for there to be new ownership going forward.
RCR could be a huge help by maintaining a large visible banner, etc presence in the stadium on game days, with an ongoing count, i.e, "### Days Without a Sale" etc
Agreed. We should not forget that it's possible to do multiple things at once -- the "Sell the Team" signage before the 2022 Semifinal, then cheering like hell for the Hometown XI and 18 during the match.
On December 20, 2022 it was announced that Mat Ishbia reached an agreement in principle to buy a majority stake in the Suns, the Mercury, and everything else involved.
This, after Robert Sarver announced on September 21 that he was puttin' the ol' place up for sale.
Just 3 months to find and vet a majority owner in principle, and only another 45-ish days until the NBA Board of Governors approved the sale of the Suns and Mercury to Ishbia.
Within mere weeks, Ishbia was overriding the front office he'd acquired and telling them to pay whatever it took to get Durant into purple-and-orange.
I'm guessing the Phoenix transaction was more complicated than buying the Thorns and resolving the lease issue and decoupling the franchises.
I'm also guessing Kang's acquisition of OL Kang while partitioning OL Reign from her ownership of DC Kang is also more complicated.
Yeah, agreed. I don't know a thing about basketball, but I agree it's bizarre how quickly the OL process has moved. I think it's very close to being done. I saw reports on the 30th that it was all but signed.
A possible reason for the almost complete blackout on news about sale of the team: the potential buyers might well be insisting on that silence as a condition for continuation of the process. Let's face it: there will be a segment among the supporters for whom virtually _no_ potential buyer will be sufficiently pristine. That segment is also likely to be extremely noisy about their objections. That's their perfect right...but the aforementioned less-than-pristine potential buyer may be unwilling to tolerate the social media shitshow until after the sale is a fait accompli.
Just a theory. Hell, there may not BE a potential buyer willing to pony up the asking price. Until recently, the franchise's unprecedented attendance numbers were running at a modest fraction of their former glory. Those numbers, even if they fully return to their peak, won't be best in the league again (although they'll certainly be close). The team's revenue stream might be too small in relation to the price to make the acquisition sufficiently attractive to anyone not willing to look beyond the short-term bottom line (and there aren't a whole lot of Michelle Kangs in this world). Deep pockets folk might be waiting to see what happens in the WoSo world after WWC23: will the rise continue...or will the buzz die down?
Ryan Clarke of The O has said recently said that he inquires often. It has to be a complicated transaction, given how the current operations are shared by the Thorns and Timbers. But the skeptical me thinks Paulson is asking for an unreasonable sale price or at this late stage is just going through the motions and plans to retain ownership. After all, the value of NWSL teams continues to soar.
I'm glad Clarke asks. I think we need more people asking. Right now, there is every chance that the club goes into the 2024 Annual Member Renewal and Relocation process without any updates on the status of the sale. That is unacceptable.
I am not saying this because I believe Paulson needs to go; that's not my point.
I am saying this because Paulson needs to either sh!t or get off the pot for the good of the club, the league, and all the stakeholders.
Asking is one thing. But Clarke would be doing us all a great service if he REPORTED that he keeps asking and keeps getting put off- that would at least start some PR pressure on the league/team to respond.
Exactly. What does often mean? 1x week? 1x month? Would like exactly what you said....an article bout the lack of movement or noise. Get the league on record also. It's not benefitting the welfare of players on this team for this to be dragging on...I wish that was talked about more.
At this point it is 100% clear that Paulson doesn't have to sell it he doesn't want to. The fan base already did what they were going to do and the people that were going to boycott are gone and replaced with new people that don't care. There was a stretch where attendance was down and I would see people in the section around me that had been there since day 1 missing. Now their seats are filled with new people who are new to the league and are just happy to be there. I don't see a path that gets the current fan base more worked up than the fan base from two years ago or achieves more significant collective action. Paulson won.
Yeah, I haven't seen a strong statement from Berman, on behalf of the Board of Governors, that he *must* sell the team. All I have seen is that Berman pledged to help move along a sale expeditiously. I have to admit that I wonder whether Merritt might be nervy enough to wait us out.
I think it's the opposite; the league has more -or-less said straight out that it will not lean on Paulson about the sale. So there's no "push" from anyone with the power and money to make a difference...
The longer the sale drags on, the less time the new owners have to retool the team and hire staff. I doubt Mike Norris will be retained. He was a convenient fill-the-vacancy-immediately hire, and who from the outside would seek the job knowing the team was being sold? As for Karina LeBlanc, who knows what constraints she might be working under and whether she will stay on. Paulson isn't going to invest heavily in the team if he indeed will sell it.
There's radio silence and there's motoring twenty miles off the coast and dropping the radio into the Pacific. I'm baffled at the lack of meaningful communication.
Agree. The front office was never highly communicative but became much more tight-lipped because of the scandals. Which was exactly the opposite of what it should have done.
I'm thinking perhaps there should be a coordinated effort -- NOT led by the RCRs, so it is not so easily compartmentalized and swept away, but certainly from a wide swath of Thorns fans -- to contact Heather Davis and Jessica Berman maybe once a week now, to request updates on the status of the Thorns sale.
I'm also thinking perhaps anybody who has media credentials should be asking this question just as frequently.
It's been 7 months now. Time for an update and some transparency.
The next NWSL (or- sorry, Phoecerman and others on here- PTFC) media person who asks hard substantive questions of the team and league will be the first. Not even Meg Linehan, despite her great work. It seems from what i've seen/read that Jeff Kassouf comes to closest to daring to being wished into the cornfield.
I was surprised no one asked Norris about the lack of NTRP's in the post-match presser. Having 3 actual midfielders, only 1 (maybe 2) of whom are 90 mins fit and then trying to shoehorn random players in to cover? Poor. Would've liked to hear an answer, though to be fair, Norris can only do so much there if KK isn't doing her job.
Re: the sale...Paulson will benefit from all media being distracted by and a part of the WC media circus. Which, of course is a good thing...but Paulson will still benefit from having larger media folks distracted. Would love direct questions, even if it's to the coach, so other folks will start to feel pressure. We have 3 clubs for sale, 2 of whom have been for sale for 7 months now, and one of whom is thee premiere club of the last decade....why is no one talking about this?
Agree, Kassouf has market and marketing sensibilities and asks the questions that need asking.
Announcement was Nov. 1st, wasn't it? Maybe I'm off by a month. Either way, I wish NWSL would put some pressure on as well, but they've said "no rush on the sale while we find some worthy hands." Just could be the undoing of a decade of work building up this club and roster while everything currently is being neglected, whether due to incompetence or tied hands.
Can some local reporters dig more into this? If the club won't speak about it, maybe contact the league? Any pressure would be nice! We don't even know if anyone is interested at this point.
It would be such a miss to not be able to capitalize on the World Cup for a new owner, especially because the star looking to carry the USA is the star of this club. So many eyeballs, they could be selling so much merch, making splashy announcements, ect....just, there's been nothing. KC has KCxUSA merch available and they don't even have one damn player on the US team! They also have a bunch of merch for the rest of their internationals. We just do literally nothing. Nothing was done for Pride, nothing for Juneteenth, nothing for AAPI month, women's history month, black history month....they did the bare minimum (which I think was more just the league.) Bare minimum for Pride- rainbow numbers. Bare minimum for Juneteenth- players wore tshirts and someone sang "Lift Every Voice and Sing" (which again, the league had every club do.) The club itself doesn't deserve the fans here honestly, it's done nothing to earn the respect of this community in recent years. I'd rather continue on with a new shitty owner (if that's the case), than carry on tethered to Merritt Paulson while he profits until someone meets his demands....it's so utterly frustrating to me.
Still 7. I had to count it on my fingers a few times to be sure... =)
https://www.timbers.com/thornsfc/news/announcement-sale-portland-thorns-2022
1) December 1 to December 31
2) January 1 to January 31
3) February 1 to February 28
4) March 1 to March 31
5) April 1 to April 30
6) May 1 to May 31
7) June 1 to June 30
But, yes, we're now into our 8th month of this water-treading.
And, honestly, it asks a helluva lot of the fans and the players, both of whom have been doing their best, to show up.
Attendance is up, merch and concessions sales are presumably strong, the crowds are loud, etc.
The team should be doing better than they are, but at least they are in 2nd in a 12-team league with just about 1/3rd of the season to go..
One could easily almost forget that the owner promised to sell the team because now was the time and it was in everybody's best interests for there to be new ownership going forward.
Let's not forget. Let's get it resolved.
Yeha, I see it's Dec. 1st rather than Nov. 1st. Seemed like we were hardly able to enjoy a championship win before more uncertain and/or bad news.
What an exhausting 3 or so years being a fan of this club.
It's only felt like 8 months.... and another couple of years. =)
RCR could be a huge help by maintaining a large visible banner, etc presence in the stadium on game days, with an ongoing count, i.e, "### Days Without a Sale" etc
Agreed. We should not forget that it's possible to do multiple things at once -- the "Sell the Team" signage before the 2022 Semifinal, then cheering like hell for the Hometown XI and 18 during the match.
On December 20, 2022 it was announced that Mat Ishbia reached an agreement in principle to buy a majority stake in the Suns, the Mercury, and everything else involved.
This, after Robert Sarver announced on September 21 that he was puttin' the ol' place up for sale.
Just 3 months to find and vet a majority owner in principle, and only another 45-ish days until the NBA Board of Governors approved the sale of the Suns and Mercury to Ishbia.
Within mere weeks, Ishbia was overriding the front office he'd acquired and telling them to pay whatever it took to get Durant into purple-and-orange.
I'm guessing the Phoenix transaction was more complicated than buying the Thorns and resolving the lease issue and decoupling the franchises.
I'm also guessing Kang's acquisition of OL Kang while partitioning OL Reign from her ownership of DC Kang is also more complicated.
Yeah, agreed. I don't know a thing about basketball, but I agree it's bizarre how quickly the OL process has moved. I think it's very close to being done. I saw reports on the 30th that it was all but signed.
A possible reason for the almost complete blackout on news about sale of the team: the potential buyers might well be insisting on that silence as a condition for continuation of the process. Let's face it: there will be a segment among the supporters for whom virtually _no_ potential buyer will be sufficiently pristine. That segment is also likely to be extremely noisy about their objections. That's their perfect right...but the aforementioned less-than-pristine potential buyer may be unwilling to tolerate the social media shitshow until after the sale is a fait accompli.
Just a theory. Hell, there may not BE a potential buyer willing to pony up the asking price. Until recently, the franchise's unprecedented attendance numbers were running at a modest fraction of their former glory. Those numbers, even if they fully return to their peak, won't be best in the league again (although they'll certainly be close). The team's revenue stream might be too small in relation to the price to make the acquisition sufficiently attractive to anyone not willing to look beyond the short-term bottom line (and there aren't a whole lot of Michelle Kangs in this world). Deep pockets folk might be waiting to see what happens in the WoSo world after WWC23: will the rise continue...or will the buzz die down?
Again, just some speculation...
Ryan Clarke of The O has said recently said that he inquires often. It has to be a complicated transaction, given how the current operations are shared by the Thorns and Timbers. But the skeptical me thinks Paulson is asking for an unreasonable sale price or at this late stage is just going through the motions and plans to retain ownership. After all, the value of NWSL teams continues to soar.
I'm glad Clarke asks. I think we need more people asking. Right now, there is every chance that the club goes into the 2024 Annual Member Renewal and Relocation process without any updates on the status of the sale. That is unacceptable.
I am not saying this because I believe Paulson needs to go; that's not my point.
I am saying this because Paulson needs to either sh!t or get off the pot for the good of the club, the league, and all the stakeholders.
Asking is one thing. But Clarke would be doing us all a great service if he REPORTED that he keeps asking and keeps getting put off- that would at least start some PR pressure on the league/team to respond.
Exactly. What does often mean? 1x week? 1x month? Would like exactly what you said....an article bout the lack of movement or noise. Get the league on record also. It's not benefitting the welfare of players on this team for this to be dragging on...I wish that was talked about more.
100%
At this point it is 100% clear that Paulson doesn't have to sell it he doesn't want to. The fan base already did what they were going to do and the people that were going to boycott are gone and replaced with new people that don't care. There was a stretch where attendance was down and I would see people in the section around me that had been there since day 1 missing. Now their seats are filled with new people who are new to the league and are just happy to be there. I don't see a path that gets the current fan base more worked up than the fan base from two years ago or achieves more significant collective action. Paulson won.
Yeah, I haven't seen a strong statement from Berman, on behalf of the Board of Governors, that he *must* sell the team. All I have seen is that Berman pledged to help move along a sale expeditiously. I have to admit that I wonder whether Merritt might be nervy enough to wait us out.
I think it's the opposite; the league has more -or-less said straight out that it will not lean on Paulson about the sale. So there's no "push" from anyone with the power and money to make a difference...
Also this... league wants to drive up the values of the expansion franchises and has too many existing clubs up for sale all at once.