The U.S. Open Cup Really Needs a Sponsor

And then there were three.

The Seattle Sounders, a USL First Division team, knocked off Chivas USA, 3-1, last night in the third round of the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup. In fact, five out of eight MLS clubs, all of whom entered the U.S. Open Cup in the third round, have been upset by USL clubs. The Los Angeles Galaxy was upset by the Richmond Kickers, the top USL Second Division club, earlier this week. The Chicago Fire, the defending U.S. Open Cup champs, were beaten 1-0 by the Carolina Railhawks, a USL-1 expansion team.

And nobody knows about this. U.S. Open Cup matches aren't shown anywhere on TV, they're barely covered in local press where the games are played, and attendance for most of these matches has been very small. 3,589 fans showed up at Qwest Field last night for the Seattle-Chivas match. There's a growing sentiment that some MLS clubs care so little for this tournament and that they're fielding reserve squads for these games and getting out early to focus on other things.

This is not the fault of MLS. This is the fault of the Unites States Soccer Federation, which organizes this competition.

What does it say about American soccer when you can watch the FA Cup, England's top domestic cup competition, on Fox Soccer Channel, but the U.S. Open Cup, America's domestic cup competition, is relegated to streaming video feeds on USL's web site?

Consider the prize money at stake here, too. The U.S. Open Cup champion receives $100,000 and a nice trophy. Compare that to the FA Cup winner, who receives £2 million and an automatic bid to the UEFA Cup. That doesn't include the TV money and the share of the gate receipts for each game. Gate receipts alone have been known to save lower league clubs from bankruptcy in England. The U.S. Open Cup? No TV money, and really lousy attendance.

Even Superliga, a made-for-TV competiton between MLS clubs and top Mexican clubs, awards the winner $1 million. Some pundits have suggested that clubs participating in Superliga tanked their U.S. Open Cup matches to focus on the richer tournament.

If the USSF wants to avoid this perception in the future, it needs to find a sponsor that will chip in and raise the prize pool for this tournament. A $100K first prize clearly doesn't interest MLS clubs anymore, but $500K might make it more interesting. Then it needs to get these matches on television so that people can watch them. Fox Soccer Channel could certainly use the programming right about now. They have been airing reruns of Premier League and Serie A matches in prime time this month.

The USSF should also talk to CONCACAF about getting the U.S. Open Cup winner into the CONCACAF Champions Cup. That might make MLS clubs a bit more interested. Getting the winner into Superliga might be a bit more of a longshot, since that tournament was organized in part by MLS to increase its exposure south of the border, but it wouldn't hurt to ask, either.

Until something like this happens to improve the profile of the U.S. Open Cup, though, it's will continue to toil in obscurity, and MLS clubs that may have cared about it a few years ago will simply drop out and let the USL clubs have their fun. If this many upsets happened in the FA Cup, England would be bonkers right now. Clearly, this tournament needs someone to champion it -- even if it means renaming it the "Lamar Hunt Umbro Cup" or the "Lamar Hunt Cialis Cup."

Hey, here's an idea -- "Lamar Hunt FanHouse Cup." What say ye, Mr. Mottram? Can we get AOL to hook that up?