There have been a lot of hurt feelings over this whole MLS expansion deal. Over on Reddit a lot of cities ranked behind Raleigh felt we were being ‘homers’ in our rankings. First off, we are homers – but it’s not like we said Raleigh was for sure getting a team. You are just mad because you fell behind us in the rankings. I’m mainly talking about complainers in Tampa and Charlotte. Let’s just go about our daily lives and continue to forget about Tampa. This brings us to Charlotte, aka Raleigh’s Minor League hockey city. This whole Charlotte vs Raleigh and what the MLS is going to do got me thinking…Instead of just potentially picking one of us, they should award BOTH cities a franchise (Make sure you award Raleigh before Charlotte though). I’m a North Carolina guy and a sports guy. North Carolina sports are founded on college rivalries; we’re already programmed not to like each other, so why not build upon this at the MLS level?

It’s kind of unspoken but people in Raleigh and Charlotte don’t love each other. Raleigh folks not huge fans of Charlotte, and Charlotte thinks their rival is Atlanta (you’re way better than Atlanta so don’t stoop to that level) but they aren’t fond that Raleigh is the state capital . Think about how fired up people would be with a MLS level Raleigh vs Charlotte soccer match! Expansion people talking about built in rivalries? BOOM! I dare you to give me one with more potential firepower (we can talk about it over some beers. I’ll buy first round…you get the rest.)

Lets jump into some comparisons:

RALEIGH CHARLOTTE Great Not as Great Stewards of the Earth Corporate Fat Cats Fewer South Carolinians More South Carolinians Better at Soccer Worse at Soccer Beautiful Downtown They’ll let you know they only have ‘Uptown’ Steve Malik No Steve Malik

Tell Commissioner Don Garber to give me a call. This genius idea is free. All we request in return is a team in Raleigh and maybe if you have some spots left then throw one the Queen City’s way.