If you have ever wished you could vote to have the person who runs your favorite sports team fired, or kept, the Seattle Sounders are making that dream come true for their fans.
Sounders season-ticket holders and members of The Alliance, the club's official member assocation, will take part in an online vote to either retain general manger Adrian Hanauer (pictured on the left), or to replace him. The vote will take place from Oct. 7th to Dec. 7th.
The practice is patterned after the model of some European clubs, like FC Barcelona, which allow club members to vote on the position of club president.
What do you think of this move? Like the idea of letting fans vote? Would you vote to fire the people who currently run your favorite club?
Share your thoughts below.
Pwned.
Wocka wocka! Oh, election season.
I disagree. Even to the non-fan, corporate accountability is (or should be) of the utmost importance. A soccer franchise is like a miniature corporation. The more fan (or customer) input, the better.
I’d like to see more of this in soccer and other sports.
Do you have to show a picture ID?
Can they vote out the artificial turf?
Frankly Timmy, i don’t give a flying f@@k what the general, non-soccer obsessed public think of this. This is a wonderful development in the progression of club futbol in the USA. This adds to the organization’s credibility as a football CLUB. Well done Sounders FC.
This is not without precedent in US sports. The Green Bay Packers are owned by stockholders who are allowed to vote on the Board of Directors each year
I’m no expert, but this doesn’t seem like the type of thing that makes MLS look very credible in the eyes of the general, non soccer-obsessed public. What a farce
Silly fool, without the Galaxy making high profile moves the league would still be floundering about and your precious Sounders would still be in 2nd div.
Lots of misinformation here, so I’ll try and clear a few things up. (I’m the Sounders FC Alliance Council President, so I’ve got a pretty good inside view on this.)
The vote will be audited by an accounting firm. One of the Council members is also an accountant/auditor, so he’ll be auditing the auditors.
The vote will be using a third-party online voting provider. There are security methods in place to ensure the voting is on the up-and-up.
We’ll also be doing voting in person at the stadium for games in the next couple of months. We’ll have tablets or netbooks or something (undetermined yet, someone at the Club is setting them up) and use them to log on to the vote site.
Only Alliance members (and each season ticket comes with an Alliance membership) can vote, so we don’t have to worry about someone from the outside.
The reality is that the Alliance, and the notion of “Democracy in Sports”, is something that is taking some time to grow- but being able to vote on your team’s GM is a pretty damn big deal.
We have confidence that by getting a large representation of the Alliance overall, and the season ticket base, we’ll get a good result.
WORD.. but that’s never going to satisfy the homers on this site. They’re the type who’ll buy a Beckham jersey when LA comes to play their side
The defense has let in the second fewest goals in the league this year. If you take out a stretch where the starting keeper and his backup were both injured so the team started a 22 year old they’d be leading goals against by a large margin. Last year they were 4th best.
Seriously where does that perception come from?
In the sounders four years of existence they’ve got the second most points of any team over that period. They’ve made the playoffs every season. They’ve made the champions league three times. They’ve gotten to the knock out stage of the champion’s league twice and they’ve won three US open cups. The only real knock on their record is that they haven’t won a playoff series yet, but that’s only a disappointment because the rest of the results have been so phenomenal.
I doubt he’ll be removed.
You mean the defense that’s given away the second fewest goals in the league?
Yes, the rules changed for everyone, exactly when LAG needed it to to make a move. How funny how that turned out. Definitely just a coincidence. Not favoring or bending any rules at all for them.
He has had 4 years to fix the defense…
While he wasn’t the same when he left, Ljungberg helped kick start the franchise and MLS 2.0 when he arrived.
Seattle is the type of team that can bring in a big name DP and they haven’t since Day 1.
They could be so much better if they acquired a quality Center Back to anchor the defense.
Eugene doesn’t know what it’s talking about.
This season ticket holder will be voting YES.
At least in this vote I get to pick somebody I like whereas in the presidential election that is not the case.
“…and LAG has only had a few cap rules bent for them over the years.”
That’s a stupid thing to say. The rules have been changed for everyone, not just the Galaxy. “Rules bent” implies the Galaxy received special treatment, which they didn’t.
Last time I checked they are, and LAG has only had a few cap rules bent for them over the years.
I wouldn’t vote to fire Erik Soler from the Red Bulls, but I don’t know if Adrian Hanauer can survive this vote given that the club hasn’t reeled in an MLS Cup over the last few years since joining MLS. Someone has to pay for Seattle missing something every year.
Well, not sure whether this is a good or bad idea. Last year there was a sizeable majority of SJ fans who wanted GM John Doyle and HC Frank Yallop out. Had such opinions been expressed through a vote on management, maybe SJ would not be having such a good run this season. I’m not saying fans don’t know what they’re talking about, but their perspective can be short-sighted.
Even as an informed fan I don’t think fans know more than GMs. Nice idea but is this to be taken seriously?
dude, your list of so-called “good moves” were effing BRILLIANT moves. also, Ljundberg was not a total bust and Fernandez as a DP was not exactly detrimental either.
complete neutral here, but if you are a sounders fan and even think about voting against him, you are crazy. maybe there is more to it than I realize of course
Great idea. Too bad Toronto, Chivas, Colorado, New England, New York, and Portland don’t have the same thing…
He should win the vote easily unless the Sounders fans have gone completely mental.
Sounders STH here, and will be voting. I take this vote seriously. I’ll probably vote to retain Adrian but not before thinking about it twice.
Good moves: Montero, Rosales, Alonso, big EJ gamble
Busts: Nkufo, Ljundberg, Flaco as DP
Good performance thus far for an expansion side 4 years in. But the expectation is that it’s time to win something other than the USOC with this nucleus this year or next.
The problem is that by the level of crap product that the STH and SG revolt — IMO there’s probably a healthy amount of status quo fanboys in most STH and SG because of the requisite dedication to the cause (and the relative novelty of it all…..I think it might be different if we were talking Liverpool or Madrid fans right now, people not merely content to sing and take in the new thing of pro soccer)– traditional ownership groups and front offices would themselves be tossing people overboard. Portland, Toronto.
I personally think Seattle is not as good as it should be and needs some kind of change. Surprisingly so-so for a Schmid team.
I also think that there are probably many many more layers of Barca bureaucracy. I’m assuming their jefe is someone who you have to catch between lunches and golf outings. In comparison Seattle is probably leaner.
Why not. A lot of the folks on this blog can vote for the President, and I’d dare say that position has more impact than the GM of the Sounders.
If only we the fans of DC United could do the same… I know Kasper wouldn’t be with the team any longer.
The reason why it “got to the point” is because 4 years elapsed. The Sounders’ Alliance charter requires a vote every 4 years.
No.. if he sucked– like Gavin Wilkinson — he’d be HISTORY
This idea is beyond good- it’s fantastic. The concept is the wet dream of many fanbases.
I know this was declared before the team ever took the field and I know this is a PR move (“look at us, we let our FANS vote on our GM!”) but this is really stupid. It makes it look like a clown show. Just look at all of our stupid comments on blogs like this. Do you really want the leadership of your club being decided on by guys like us? I don’t.
Glad Imperative Voice is not voting.
This was agreed on from the beginning. Drew Carey made it contingent on his joining the ownership group, and was promised to the fans who bought into the Supporters Club all along.
Glad they’re honoring the commitment, and I’d say they’re safe.
Sounds like a mixed bag. I know the stereotype is they have the skin in the game, but my feeling with STHs and SGs is with mediocre to good teams they trend status quo, even if the team’s not getting serious silverware. Too bought in already. Their skin in the game may make it hard for them to throw out too much of what they are paying to cheer/ involved in cheering for.
Seattle is OK where with its setup they should kick ass. Fire Hanauer.
Come on Ives, you make it sound like they just decided to have a vote! This happens every four years, whether the GM is doing great or sucking.
You mean won the “bid to host” cup and not much else? With your attendance and likely balance sheet you should be giving LA a run for its money but you’re not.
it says season ticket holders and members of the Alliance. I assume only they can vote and they have some system of ensuring that only they can vote.
Ugh. Voting is limited to season ticket holders and members of supporter’s group.
@old-school No, you have to be a STH and your account number is only allowed one vote (unless you have more than one ST on that account I believe )
This comment would be a lot more helpful if it realized the whole stunt is just about pandering to the Sounders fan base and not actually a referendum on how the guy is doing.
The main point of the article is that fans have the ability to vote, not on how they should vote. I believe it’s done every couple of years.
@azzy It didn’t “get to a point where they needed to decide”, this vote happens every 4 yrs regardless of the club’s or gm’s performance.
Fans voting online?
So, just throwing this out there: opposing players, owners and front office could presumably help cast a vote for the future employment of a Seattle Sounder executive?
I thought it was a fun idea they borrowed (from Barca, iirc?) but don’t they at least cast some form of balloting or voting in person?
Neat concept, the delivery leaves a lot to be desired imo. *Disclaimer: Not a Sounder fan in the least*
This article would be a lot more helpful if it included any kind of information on Hanauer’s performance, key signings, major failures, why it got to the point where they’d need to decide whether to keep him or not, etc.
You would have to be insane to want to fire Adrian Hanauer after what we have accomplished/become in four years