MLS boss’ common refrain: The Whitecaps can’t carry on at B.C. Place

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The Vancouver Whitecaps cannot carry on as they are, Don Garber reiterated this week.

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The MLS commissioner visited Vancouver this week looking to shake loose the apparently stagnant Whitecaps stadium story.

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The lease the Whitecaps have with B.C. Place stinks, he says and it’s also set to expire in December. A new one is needed for next season — and the fact it’s still not sorted is on him, he claimed.

“That’s reckless on my part,” he said Friday, speaking with a roundtable of reporters and other local media figures. He has long been an optimist, he said. He was optimistic the Whitecaps’ lease situation would be sorted for next year.

Obviously B.C. Place’s operators, PavCo and ultimately the provincial government, need a regular tenant like the Whitecaps in the fold, so from Garber’s perspective it’s a bit mystifying that there hasn’t been more give from the political bosses.

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He doesn’t blame PavCo’s Chris May, who he suggested has his hands tied from above.

“Their job is to run that building the way they’re charged to run it, but those restrictions and those challenges make it untenable for the Vancouver Whitecaps,” Garber said flatly.

It’s rhetoric we’ve heard before. The lease stinks. The Caps need a soccer specific stadium. They can’t carry on like this.

This is a business, not a charity and if the team’s owners say they’ve been losing a mint for years and they’ve essentially reached the end of their financial rope — fair enough.

The Whitecaps have a strong connection with the community. They’ve drawn huge crowds this year. And they’ve landed one of the world’s star players. Thomas Muller has made a huge impact on the field but also in the broader discussion.

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The team is a talking point again. Perhaps still not to the level of the Canucks, where even as they struggle through another season remain the avatar but the Caps are a talking point because they’re fun and they’re winning and those things make people feel good.

That is what the team and the league is leaning on: the positivity the team brings to our community. And that definitely matters. Will people tolerate those good vibes coming at a cost to the public purse? B.C. Place, May reminded me recently, is primarily tasked with presenting a benefit to the whole community, which means finding value that will benefit the community first, the tenant second.

I did find myself pondering the difference in how sports ownership works in North America compared to Germany. Muller’s old team, the world-famous Bayern Munich, is still primarily owned by the fans. It’s a true club. The fans do have the final say.

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And the club is still massively profitable. Is there some way to leverage community interest here? I’ve no idea if you’d actually be able to build up enough equity simply from selling shares in the community. Probably not. But if we’re looking to expand B.C. Place’s community presence, if the team were in fact a partly community-owned club, might that make a difference?

Garber said he was meeting with Premier David Eby Friday; how those talks went is unknown as the Premier’s Office did not respond to a request for comment.

He also met with Vancouver mayor Ken Sim to discuss the possibility of the Caps building a soccer-specific stadium at the PNE. That transaction, if it were able to happen would be complicated.

There’s little doubt the Whitecaps’ owners would like to do more than just a stadium; just look at minority owner Jeff Mallet’s experience as an investor in the San Francisco Giants. The Giants are famed for their beautiful oceanfront stadium, Oracle Park, but the real key — Mallet will tell you — is the adjoining property the team controls.

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They make huge money beyond the baseball diamond. That’s the modern truth of sports: this is about sports teams as part of a revenue package, not revenue drivers on their own.

In many ways, Garber’s visit and meetings this week aren’t exactly news. Nothing has really changed. The news will be if a new stadium plan emerges — or the worst-case scenario for everyone involved, the Caps are sold to a buyer who moves them south. The league clearly doesn’t want that. It’s doubtful political leadership wants that.

But it’s hard to fathom the public, who are struggling financially as much as they ever had with the cost of living, would tolerate many concessions being made here.

We’ll see.

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