I'll start with some disclaimers. I don't know the first thing about how the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL) awards franchises. I expect you don't either. We refer to these civic pleas for major sports franchises as "bids", but what exactly constitutes a bid? Is there a request for proposals I can review? An application? A notice of funding opportunity? Is there a form to fill out? A list of specific targets that a city or community is expected to meet? Some measurable standards? Rubrics? Transparency? If any of those things exist please help me out, because I can't find them.
Rather, and by the look of what's happening in Columbus right now, a "bid" for an NWSL franchise consists exactly of a current billionaire MLS owner expressing interest, sending out some press releases, talking to city hall, eyeballing city property, and getting the attention of the central Ohio soccer community.
Normally, I'd be excited about the idea of expanding the women's game to Columbus, but this just feels off. Columbus wasn't a contender in the most recent NWSL franchise struggle (That process saw a solid Cleveland effort to secure a franchise lose out to Denver in the final round). If you look back further, Columbus hasn't been a part of any previous NWSL expansion discussions.
As for recent support of women's soccer here in Columbus, I wouldn't characterize it as strong. Granted, the U.S. Women's National Team visits are always a big draw, but I don't see that enthusiasm trickling down to support for the Columbus Eagles FC or the OSU Women's Soccer Team. Trust me when I say there are plenty of good seats available for any of those home matches. That's not to say Columbus wouldn't show up for an NWSL team. They most certainly would. The point is there are opportunities to support women's soccer in central Ohio already, and we're not exactly doing that.
It's into this climate that the Haslam Sports Group showed up with a dump truck full of money and promises. Suddenly, as if by magic, Columbus deserves an NWSL franchise (Note: this is the same Haslam Sports Group that presumably could have supported the aforementioned Cleveland NWSL bid given their connection to northeast Ohio and didn't).
Maybe Columbus does deserve a franchise. I don't know. Honestly though, what does "deserve" even in mean in the context of a system with no discernable metrics or selection criteria? Columbus did #savethecrew after all, so there's that. Still, it's hard to have watched Cleveland be denied an NWSL franchise via a bid that was years in the making, only to have the Haslams waltz in with their millions and, within weeks, Columbus is somehow at the front of the line. It's also hard (if we are indeed interested in "growing the game") to justify the possibility of Cincinnati having one top-tier professional soccer franchise, Columbus having two, and Cleveland having zero.
Look, I know how the world works. I know who wins, who loses, and why.
All of which is to say you're not really reading a post about women's soccer. You're reading a post about capitalism. You're reading about how billionaires have the power to support communities, ignore communities, and abandon communities on a whim. You're reading about how cities can be pitted against one another in a system that is opaque and unfair by design. You're reading a post about monopolies; about the end result of manufactured scarcity and exorbitant franchise fees that are in place to drive up costs and keep money and power in the hands of a few. And like professional soccer, most of us are just spectators.
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