Montreal and MLS: a perfect marriage, or too much Canadian closeness?

MLS commissioner Don Garber is in Montreal today to discus expansion into yet another Canadian market. That would make three, along with Toronto and (starting in 2011) Vancouver. Every time I think of this, my first instinct is to invade Canada.

Oh, crap! Wait! That’s Dick Cheney’s first instinct. I sometimes get confused.

Seriously, I sometimes recoil a bit and wonder if MLS is guilty of a league-level wandering eye. The Tiger Woods of professional leagues?

What I mean is this: Is MLS overlooking tempting and worthy markets in its own back yard, the United States, while disproportionately stocking up on Canadian clubs, overly smitten by the evocative ingenue of foreign lands? I mean, St. Louis still looks like a wonderful MLS candidate, if that gung ho ownership group in The Lou can ever satisfy the MLS suits’ requirements of sufficient cash reserves. And other markets look enticing, too.

Then again, Montreal has a lot going. A solid ownership group stands at the ready. (I know that for fans, thinking about ownership groups and cash reserves is a real buzz kill, not nearly as much fun as dissecting stadiums and national maps and such. But when it comes to stability in the big picture, good ownership is like the flour tortilla on a big ol’ burrito: it holds everything together.)

The team in Montreal has been around for 16 years and already averages more than 12,000 fans a game in a second-tier league. The 13,000-seat Saputo Stadium is a little gem.

Last February the Montreal Impact met Mexico’s Santos Laguna of Mexico in a first-leg CONCACAF Champions League quarterfinals. (The Canadians prevailed, 2-0.)

As the brilliant little Stade Saputo (here’s the link, again, in case you were too lazy to go to it last time) was deemed too small and unsuitable for winter weather. (Night time … February … Canada … would you want to be there?) So they moved the match indoors to Olympic Stadium.

There, safely tucked in beneath a blanket of fluffy white snow, a cozy crowd of 55,571 rocked the Quebec night. The match created a real buzz around Canada’s second largest city.

It’s about then that I think, “Montreal? Hmmm. Sounds pretty good.”

What do you think?