Splash Could Be Left High and Dry

Despite being the Continental Indoor Soccer League’s model franchise, having the league’s second-highest attendance and winning two division titles, the Splash might cease operations today.

Tim Ryan, Splash general manager, said he expects to know this morning whether the team will play the 1996 season at The Pond.

Ryan and Brad Mayne, The Pond’s general manager and the team’s co-governor, have talked with prospective partners the past two months after being told to find a partner by Ogden Facility Management, the New York-based corporation that runs The Pond.

“Even as well as we did, the economics of running a team didn’t meet our financial expectations of the first two years,” Ryan said. “This is a price-sensitive sport and I don’t think a [ticket]-price increase will ease our financial concerns. Hopefully, we can put together a package, either a partnership or a transfer of ownership that will keep the team here.”

Ryan spoke with possible partners Monday and will hold another discussion this morning before a CISL Board of Governors meeting. Team owners will make financial disclosures today indicating their willingness to move forward.

CISL Commissioner Ron Weinstein is astonished at Ogden’s action.

“This franchise has more potential to become successful than any professional soccer franchise that currently exists in the U.S.,” Weinstein said. “To let it go, and for someone to not step up to the table, is criminal.

“Anybody getting involved should turn a profit in the next 24 months if they’re afforded the same opportunities Ogden has available to it. If every team in the league was experiencing the upward curve in the success pattern that the Splash had, I could very confidently tell you the CISL was on its way to being the fifth major sport in this country.”

Five of the league’s 15 franchises turned a profit in 1995. The Splash nearly broke even.

Ogden assumed ownership of the Los Angeles United franchise on Feb. 7, 1994, moved it from the Forum and renamed it.

After averaging only 1,913 fans in Los Angeles, the Splash averaged 4,688 in 1994 and 8,429 last year.

Ryan said 1,106 season tickets already have been sold for 1996, and though the franchise was on target for in his five-year plan, “we didn’t meet the goals that were set out for us by our corporate office,” he said.

Ryan’s five-year plan included a profit in the third year.

Weinstein said this is a bad time to bail out and that Ogden’s corporate office should look at the big picture.

Chicago, New York and Orlando are looming on the expansion horizon in 1997, and current league owners would share in a combined $3-million franchise fee. The league also is currently discussing a television contract with Nickelodeon and CBS, and has for the first time hired a marketing company to help enlist national corporate sponsors.

The league could be losing the Splash on the day it awards a franchise to Indianapolis.

“To get out now,” Weinstein said, “doesn’t make any sense.”