On Thursday, Indianapolis Mayor Joe Hogsett announced plans to bring a Major League Soccer expansion club to the city. Hogsett said that he flew to New York on Monday to meet with MLS commissioner Don Garber and see if the league would consider Indianapolis as a potential new market.
“As a result of that conversation, I am today informing Indianapolis that, as mayor, I will be leading an effort to file an MLS application and pursue an MLS club,” Hogsett announced at a press conference. “I am well aware that this new venture will present no guarantee, but every great achievement in our city’s history has begun where opportunity was met with action.”
Current expansion fees are hovering at $500 million, which is what San Diego FC will pay to enter the league in 2025. San Diego will be the league’s 30th club.
Typically ownership groups, together with state and local government support, make a formal and public bid to secure an MLS side. In a press release, Hogsett said that an ownership group is “forming” and that it will include a group of investors led by “an experienced and well-respected sports executive, who has held leadership roles in MLS and global soccer.”
A source briefed on the league’s expansion plans told The Athletic on Thursday that expansion beyond 30 teams has not yet been discussed by its board of governors. Tom Glick, who most recently served as Chelsea Football Club’s president of business, is the executive who Hogsett referred to, according to multiple sources, who were granted anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter. Glick was previously president of Tepper Sports & Entertainment and helped launch MLS side Charlotte FC in 2022.
Glick left Chelsea in October of last year, after just 10 months on the job, following Chelsea asking external lawyers to review his handling of a sexual harassment complaint made against another executive. Glick and Hogsett’s communications team did not immediately provide comment when contacted by The Athletic.
Indianapolis is currently home to USL Championship side Indy Eleven. The club is working with real estate company Keystone Group to develop an expansive sports complex that would include a new 20,000-seat stadium for Indy Eleven. The club and Keystone Group broke ground on the proposed $1 billion complex in June of 2023. Hogsett and Indiana Governor Eric Holcomb were both on hand.
On Thursday, a press release from Keystone Group published by the Indianapolis Business Journal referred to Hogsett’s announcement as “troubling.”
“Unfortunately, after recent bipartisan approvals from the City-County Council, Mayor Joe Hogsett’s administration is preparing to walk away from the state and city leaders who entrusted him with this project and the neighborhoods who are depending on the progress Eleven Park represents. This is more than disappointing – it’s a shocking reversal of Mayor Hogsett’s public support for this project at the 2023 groundbreaking, for the dozens of local investors in this team, the thousands of Marion County jobs committed by Indiana companies who have been working on this project, and the tens of thousands of Indy Eleven fans in Indiana and across the country,” the release read in part.
MLS was not part of the city’s decision to abandon the project, according to the aforementioned source.
When reached for comment regarding Hogsett’s announcement, MLS provided the following statement: “It was exciting to hear Mayor Hogsett’s vision for a new soccer-specific stadium in Indianapolis.”
Indy Eleven did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Adam Crafton also contributed to this report.
(Photo of Mayor Joe Hogsett: Juan OCampo/NBAE via Getty Images)
