Blows me away too since i said they had 15 teams that could draw over 10k fans. I don't rmemeber saying anything about the quality. Actually we are talking about an 8 year period between 76-83 where man teams mangaed to average over 13k in attendance. 76 7 teams 77 8 78 6 79 10 80 10 81 9 82 5 83 3 This all occurred in a period of time where the wasn't even a tenth as popular as it is today. People need to stop making excuses for MLS's inability to get people interested in it product. Which is why you need money to attract quality players at the low end and at in the middle. Unskilled players drag down the quality of the product. The product could improve immensely simply by getting rid of the guys who don't know how to play the game but get to hang around simply because they will work for peanuts. How about the people who already like the game? Why has MLS seemingly given up on these people?
Not when I lived there they didn't (only a little over a year ago)-- and according to the schedule here http://skysports.planetfootball.com/list.asp?hlid=217652 that hasn't changed-- still only a couple of live games per week. Are there more elsewhere or perhaps you were thinking of when they were on ITV Digital? it seemed like they showed every last game...
Presumably, though, you think there was some link between the quality and the large attendance numbers. I mean, that was your point, wasn't it?
But that's OK. I saw an MLS game today where a team continuously played high-balls to a 5'8" forward, who not so unexpectedly won none of them. MLS may be a fairly athletic (Guppy looks to be in super slo-mo out there) league but its skill level often leaves a lot to be desired. Electronics seems to be about double. Housing depends on where he plays in MLS. Outside of the coast based teams, the living arrangements are pretty cheap. Meaning? Let me put it this way - Youri Djourkaeff was the classiest guy on the pitch that I saw today. Another dozen of Youris would do wonders for this league.
And I saw an FA Cup semifinal where a team tried the same thing. And how often was Andy Johnson battling for a long ball today?
meaning if they think they league is crap with poor support they are less likely to go there even if the money does match what an English club has offered. The number of footballers here who have ever seen an MLS game on TV is probably tiny. Some players would probably reject the idea outright, which is their loss I suppose. You could be right, but I guarantee you won't find them in the English lower divisions. As a rule of thumb, the lower you go the more "typically English" the players become (as in playing style - they don't all go round talking like David Niven any "I say old chap" a lot). Djourkaeff is probably just as much over the hill as Guppy - he just has rather more strings to his bow so that losing any pace he had isn't so noticeable. Paul Gascoigne would probably have been terrific for MLS if he hadn't been an alcoholic and complete basket-case. And you would have had to have subtitled all his interviews - "ah divvn't knaa aboot MLS, like, bah it's canny man." As was said earlier, you'd be far better looking away from England as the English second level is far richer (but not necessarily any better) than second levels anywhere else. With an average of just over 17,000 it's the 6th best supported division in Europe. Only Germany, with 12,500 has a second level anywhere near. Italy, Spain & France get only 6500, 7500 and 6500 respectively. http://european-football-statistics.co.uk/attn.htm
Yes it was my point and NASL teams provided a brand of football higher than anything that was available in the US. Which is the problem MLS has now. They provide low grade soccer to an audience that has easy access to lots of high grade soccer options. MLS needs to give people a reason to come out and that reason doesn't have to be as good as the EPL or La Liga. Like I said most people in this country who like the game grew up with fiitball a lot worse than MLS. Most latinos in this country are not from Brazil argentina or Colombia and a large percentage of Mexicans in this country are from the North which is not as strong a football area. Football fans for the most part prefer live games to watching games on TV. Give them a product that is attractive and they will show up in larger number. There is no reason professional players should exhibit less football savy than some people in the stands do.
Rommul, sorry for misunderstanding your point about the 15 NASL teams. I don't mean this sarcastically--but if you aren't arguing that the NASL played high quality soccer, than isn't part of the point of this thread than wrong--that is, that if you improve quality you get better attendance? B/c it seems like the lesson from NASL is that you can (1) get attendance and still go broke; and (2) get attendance even if you have a shoddy product. As for the NASL attendance numbers, one can argue that they drew great crowds. But I think it's important to look at those numbers. 1. A lot of those attendence figures (such as in "73, "74, "75 and even "76) the league wasn't spending much on players. It was still decidely a minor league affair in terms of talent. Kyle Rote was a starter (a guy who started playing soccer in college!). Teams like Tampa Bay and Seattle and Portland had good talent--but much of it involved guys like Derek Smethurst or Steve Wegerle or Alex Pringle who were solid pros competing against semi-pro players. 2. We can argue that soccer wasn't as popular then as now. But that's a simplistic formula or category to use. There were fewer soccer players back then--that's true. But the media was more enamored with soccer then. ABC televised soccer ALOT--my memory could be wrong but I thought that NASL was getting 20 games a year at some points in TV coverage. The media had bought into Phil Woosnam's claim that "soccer is the sport of the 80's" and NASL teams generally got very good local coverage. I remember the Washington Diplomats getting a game photo from one match that covered the entire upper half of the spread of the front page of the sports section. Can any of you remember the last time the entire upper half of the sports section was taken up by a soccer article or picture? Soccer had less competition from other sports (ESPN wasn't wide-spread, fewer football, basket and baseball teams, NASCAR wasn't as big, no pro women's sports). And tickets were dirt cheap. I used to pay $4 for a game day ticket to see the Diplomats back in those days. Case in point, in 1981 after 15 teams averaged 10k or more in attendance that year, 7 of them then folded (half of which were over 10k in attendance). The problem with using the NASL for support in this thread is that NASL got attendence through hype (Woosnam, Toye, etc.), wide expansion (24 teams and several moved at the end of each season), rep players (most of which were past their prime) and very cheap tickets. The level of play wasn't very good. Other than Cosmos and (for a few years) the Sting and maybe Vancouver, there really were no "teams" that were intact, trained extensively and could be said to be a strong team. The record of NASL teams when they went on the road (and got people out of NFL stadiums and artificial turf) was terrible and provides a little indication of how weak the quality of NASL teams were in my opinion.
Well, that's a Catch 22 situation - if too few decent fer'ners play in MLS, then it'll continue to be crap but few decent fer'ners will play in a league that's crap. Ah, but do they say "guv'nah"? Well, I said that myself. The best bargains are to be had from South America and Eastern Europe. And it's obviosuly not the sheer attendance but the pay rate. Rubin Kazan may pay someone like Damani Ralph $600K but most of its players are probably betwen $150K-500K. Then again, with a couple of dozen of freshly minted billionaires, Russian and Ukrainian teams are doubling the available team finances every few years, putting it far ahead of the MLS pace.
1. How good was the quality of the NASL as compared to the other brands of football available to Americans? Exactly. It doesn't matter how bad you or anyone else thinks it was. It was better than whatever else was available which smply cannot be said about MLS. 2. Are we now going to pretend that over 1/3 of current MLS rosters are essentially semi pro players? I don't think the ability to earn $800-1600 a month qualifies anyone as a professional. I am not even talking about the guys who make league minimum which $29k. What exactly is the point here? All I see is excuses being made for MLS. It doesn't matter how much media people liked the NASL if the people who need to buy tickets again and again don't do so. The media in New York loves the Devils and Nets and thye get a million times more exposure than the Metrostars. Yet the Metro run neck and neck with both teams interms of getting people to come to the stadium. The bottom line is that there are more soccer fans in this country (by leaps and bounds) than there ever was in the late 70's and MLS gets a much smaller percentage of those fans than the NASL did. At some point we have to face up to the fact that people simply have decided not to patronise the product becuas ethey are not attracted by it. So what? They still brought people in. Do you think any MLS team would still be in existence if all the owners weren't billionaires? Can we please face up to that fact. Do you think if all the NASL guys were had huge fortunes like the current MLS gusy did those teams wouldn't be around? Come on. The NASL like A-League teams had to deal with the buisness realities in a way that MLS teams simply do not. North American Soccer League 1967 Los Angeles Wolves (USA) 1967 Oakland Clippers (NPSL) 1968 Atlanta Chiefs 1969 Kansas City Spurs 1970 Rochester Lancers 1971 Dallas Tornado 1972 New York Cosmos 1973 Philadelphia Atoms 1974 Los Angeles Aztecs 1975 Tampa Bay Rowdies 1976 Toronto Metros-Croatia 1977 New York Cosmos 1978 New York Cosmos 1979 Vancouver Whitecaps 1980 New York Cosmos 1981 Chicago Sting 1982 New York Cosmos 1983 Tulsa Roughnecks 1984 Chicago Sting Major League Soccer 1996 D. C. United 1997 D. C. United 1998 Chicago Fire 1999 D. C. United 2000 Kansas City Wizards 2001 San Jose Earthquakes 2002 Los Angeles Galaxy 2003 San Jose Earthquakes 2004 D. C. United For all the protestations about the Cosmos being the only good team in the league at the end of the day they won 5 titles in 14 years. At end they won 4 titles in 9 years. The exact same number of titles as DC United has won in MLS. Lets not forget MLS is all about parity where no team is supposed to be allowed to reach any kind of dominance. Now you have the NASL on the one hand where you say there was at most one quality team on any consistent basis and MLS where all teams are supposed to be more or less the same level yet the results are the same. Excuse me for not buying this claim.
I thoroughly agree with the thought that there just aren't that many Americans that a slightly increased salary cap would keep here instead of Europe. However... The guys that we could get that would improve the league substantially--that we know we could get with a $3M-$4M cap--are more players like Christian Gomez, only better. Instead of a guy from Arsenal/Nueva Chicago (as Gomez was), next time we could get a guy from Estudiantes (Soto) or Velez (Castroman). Instead of Cassio or Naldo from Brazil, we get a Brazilian the next level of quality up. Not yet equal to what the Mexicans pay, but closer, and not buying on hype the way they do. That's where the players are gonna come from--S. America. It's like a constantly stocked supermarket and the money we offer is going to directly determine what level of talent we get. MLS just doesn't have the $$$ to scout thoroughly in Africa. The Africans we get, like Ibrahim at the Metros or Ngwenya at the Galaxy, will have to come through European academies or American colleges.
I'd like to see evidence of this...like those annual surveys about what sports people watch. My gut instinct is that if you could extract MFL fans from those surveys, soccer is marginally more popular, but not more popular "by leaps and bounds." And really, that's a pretty important part of your "MLS sucks I hate it" schtick.
How good would MLS with a $5m salary cap be compared to other brands of football available to Americans? I mean, I thought your point was that MLS didn't have to close the gap because even some improvement in quality of play would bring out more fans. Which was shown by NASL. Which wasn't necessarily world-class quality of play but it was much better than what fans had otherwise. Which would mean that MLS would have to be "much better" than what fans had otherwise. I mean, I still don't get how MLS will be able to get NASL-like crowds by doubling or tripling its salary cap. What am I missing in your argument? Of course. But that's only because billionaires can take on risk like no one else... I'm not sure it's understood by some people on BigSoccer that this is how investing works.
1. Why do we need to subtract MFL fans? Don't they watch football too? 2. If I hate it so much why do I even bother talking about it. 3. No national surveys are needed. The only evidence that is needed is large amount of footbhall that is being broadcast on TV in this country as compared to even ten years ago. Did we have two networks devoted completely to soccer 30 years ago. Lay off the potshots it makes you look more petty than you really are (which is very hard to do) and try to make an argument that doesn't depend on stacking the odds
You are missing the argument. I never claimed that MLS would be able to get nasl like crowds. I used NASL as an indicator of what can be accomplished when people are offered higher quality than they are used to. And no MLS deosn't have to be much better than what is offered. There is better football from europe in Mexico Brazil Argentina and Colombia and the home leagues are still very popular. The main effect of raising the quality of play is getting rid of the players who take the field and look as if they don't know how to play the game. As I said most people in this country who are fans of football grew up on football that is worse than MLS and that includes mexicans.
OK-- but we all agree that higher quality will bring bigger crowds-- the only disagreement any of us have is "how much". Some here suggested that the uncertain extent of the impact of improved quality of play on attendance made improving quality of play somewhat specultive, compared to gaining control of existing revenue streams through stadium building. I believe your response was essentially: "Look, the NASL did it-- so why can't we do it?" So isn't it relevant that we can't be as superior to the competition as the NASL was? You also said that the absolute quality of play didn't matter so much as how much better it was relative to competition. You think they have equal access to European football in Colombia as we do? I don't know, but I'm not sure of that. Add to that the value of having a century long club tradition and the comparison becomes a very loose fit. Agree absolutely. That will help. Hopefully, the reserve league will improve this somewhat... Including Mexicans because they're from northern Mexico, which isn't futbol central? I dunno. I mean, they have televized Mexican futbol which is better than MLS.
No my point is quality football raises interest and substandard football kills it. My point is that in the past in this country when the visibility and popularity of the game was much lower teams were very successful at providing football that was a higher standard than what they had. I said it has to be a standard of football that doesn't make people feel like they know more about the game than the people on the field. I also said before I made that statement that most people who are fans of the game here grew up woth worse football than MLS which is a clear statement that MLS doesn't have to be better than every league broadcast in this country. Are we having a discussion or are you trying to engage in some sort of "gotcha" debating tactic? They great access to La Liga and Serie A especially. I have seen several articles written by people who irganise the leagues in Venezuela that they have a hard time getting people to come out to games since so many of the football fans would rather stay home and watch La Liga. I don't see how below average players playing sporadically against other below average will produce the results people are expecting. Including Mexicans from all over Mexico. Mexican football was not always as good as it is now. Most Mexicans who have been here ten years or more could attest to this.
OK-- we agree. But we might still disagree about the practical value of this insight if we can't replicate the relatively higher standard that the NASL enjoyed against its competition. You may well be right that we need only to be as good as the MFL to increase attendance, but it certainly would be much more difficult to tower over the MFL the way the NASL towered over its competition. OK-- so it's more of a "threshold" argument than a strictly linear argument that increases in quality of play will increase attendance. I can follow that and agree it's possible-- I just have no idea where to set the threshold. Unless asking how things you say which seem at odds with each other is a "debating tactic", no. This is a message board-- not a dissertation-- so points sort of accumulate willy nilly. Asking you about them isn't meant to be hostile-- it's meant to actually understand how you fit them together. Fair point. They have a similar problem to MLS-- an underdeveloped football tradition, coupled with televised competition. Any kind of practice will help MLS sort out wheat from chaffe-- more formal games will only improve that process.
This is a really important point. I think most people can forgive a player for missing a sitter or failing to trap a quality pass but it's much harder for a reasonable soccer afficionado to look at the game where a winger gets a third of the field to go one-on-one against a drawn-out defender but prefers to pass it back to almost the midfield. One play that stood out for me in the 2nd leg of Chelsea-Bayern was Joe Cole's set of Drogba's header. Most MLS players are taught to either make a back-pass to midfield or knock the ball off the defender's legs for a throw-in or a corner. Cole however showed how it can be done. He was not prohibited from making a play by Jose Mourinho and he made it. That's what I'd like MLS forwards to do, try to make a play. Sure, they may not be able to deliver a perfectly weighed ball to the penalty spot but attempting to do so would at least exhibit real soccer. A safe, useless, time and opportunity wasting back-pass would exhibit the MLS brand of soccer, which is very hard to love. With better players, that dreaded play would hopefully disappear for good.