MLS Commissioner Doug Logan presented the Chicago Fire
with their '98 championship rings Saturday and later "spoke
at length" about the team and MLS's future, according to Tim
Cronin of the DAILY SOUTHTOWN. Logan: "We've done some
things pretty right and some things pretty wrong." He said
that league-wide sponsorship contracts will be "shifted from
mostly money to a broader combination of money and
commercial time given over to promotional use," which could
"eventually triple" the MLS's marketing reach. Logan also
said that the "Queen of England ads" ESPN produced two years
ago "were cute but really did nothing for us" and added that
for this season's ad campaign, the league will take 10 "up-
and-coming players and show a vignette of something terrific
they do on the field" (DAILY SOUTHTOWN, 4/11).
THIS REVOLUTION CAN'T BE BOUGHT! The Revolution debuted
new uniforms for the third time in four years, but Reebok
"did not have them available for sale at souvenir stands in
time for the home opener." In Providence, Doug Chapman
wrote that fans could only buy last year's jersey and wrote
that "MLS has spent so much effort on marketing that team
merchandising has been allowed to suffer" (JOURNAL, 4/11).
