The USL’s winter owners’ meetings start this week. In case you missed it, league president Jake Edwards more or less laid out the league’s agenda going forward at halftime of the Championship Final. Well, I say the league’s agenda, but that may be a step too far.

The Jake, as I like to call him, talked about San Diego Loyal and Landon Donovan, of course, but he was also pretty clear about his, and perhaps the USL’s, desire to begin promotion and relegation between League One and the Championship. This isn’t the first time The Jake had made mention of this, but every time he talks about it, he’s a little more serious.

There are some whose hearts leapt for joy on hearing this discussion. There are others who dismissed the idea of promotion and relegation in the States out of hand. There are still others for whom this wasn’t enough.

The point, though, is that there’s not been any announcement yet about when and how promotion and relegation in the USL would begin or how it would work. The Jake has made the point in the past that there would need to be some stability in League One before pro/rel was viable. League One had ten teams in 2019, and one (Lansing Ignite) folded as soon as the season was over. It’s not clear how many others of the original ten are tottering on the same cliff. The league says there are five expansion teams on the horizon, but we don’t know when those teams will join the league. Two (Penn FC/Harrisburg City Islanders and Rochester Rhinos) have been essentially dead on social media since shuttering a year or two ago, so those two might not even happen.

There’s also the stability of the Championship to be considered. Nashville, Sacramento and St. Louis are all leaving in the fairly near future. Charlotte likely won’t survive MLS wading into its kiddie pool. Ottawa closed up shop. Yes, San Diego and Queensboro are coming, and there are rumors about Pawtucket and Des Moines. But so many moving parts, season over season, without promotion and relegation is challenging enough. Now imagine that, plus moving teams between leagues? As a fan, I’m into it, but as an owner, that’s a different story.

And that gets me back to this year’s annual owners’ meeting in Florida. Are all of the owners really on board with this idea? If they are, that’s great, but there’s a lot on their plate. New TV contracts, teams coming and going, vetting potential new teams, figuring out what those expansion fees are going to be, and then the discussion of how that works in a more fluid pyramid structure. It’s a lot to consider, even moreso when you understand that not all of the owners are actually soccer people. No, they’re business people who have an interest in protecting and growing their investment. How that dovetails with a system like promotion and relegation that isn’t already part of the structure remains to be seen.

Maybe The Jake is a miracle-worker after all. We’ll find out. VAMOS MORADOS.