News: Bruce Arena says the United States will be in a position to win the World Cup by 2026

But back on topic, by 2026, I like the look of a midfield of Pulisic, Tillman, Sashoua, McKennie. Hopefully Haji and Sargent can play up top. Or someone. It never quite works out the way you plan.

 

Their TV ratings for MLS have been great. Their qualifiers sold pretty well. Canada sent the most fans to Brazil of any non-participant in 2014, 11th overall.

 

There's an upward trend thanks to the good young guys coming up the pipes, and the 2016 MLS season was the beginning of a recovery, with the Canuck clubs doing well.

But there was a hiatus, a long period from 2007 to 2014 when the sport was dying. It wasn't long ago the media was whining about the lack of interest in Montreal and Vancouver.

This was the situation until the start of the 2015 season:

http://www.mountroyalsoccer.com/201...ggling-to-draw-interest-from-fans-joey-saputo

 

Thank you, our American media is doing the same thing to MLS.

 

DP and TAM are mechanisms to concentrate spending on select signings and probably keep more Americans employed than actually spreading out that money. The ratings drop, ESPN and Fox up while Univision is down, says that either it's about a specific audience and/or about a specific network (subscribers, timeslots, matchups).

 

This is what people always forget when talking about future teams - take 4 of the names listed above. By 2026, no one will remember those four names. One more will be a name that people groan when he's named to the team. One more will (hopefully) be a very good player for the team. It's a tough, tough winnowing out of youth stars into solid pros.

If you don't believe me, go back and search BS post from 8 to 10 years ago.

 

They hired someone and spent 18 months and that's what they came up with? All those gimmicks seem to just be trying to fabricating an experience and doubt they change viewership much if at all.

Maybe they could increase the size of the goals or bring back the shootout or introduce a shot clock?

 

Internet

 

MLS has players with white ancestry too you know?

 

Get animal mascots. Animals have always been the #1 selling point in sports. Eagles, goats, donkeys, etc. populate the landscape of European soccer. Liga MX associates a totem animal to each club, handy to draw cartoons about them and to use them as symbols.

Of course with our good animal cruelty laws, I'm not sure it'd be legal to keep a pig in a hot stadium during a game, for example. Or having a poor goat endure a Rapids game. Talk about cruel & unusual....

 

Just came back from the Open Cup
game between Miami United and Jacksonville Armada, good game with a bad referee.

It's so sad that lower division teams can't get promoted, it defeats the whole purpose of soccer...

Maybe the USL should experiment doing pro/rel with their new 3rd division?

 

One thing about having a South American background: you really, really get into the Libertadores. You got it in your blood.

Unlike the Champions, the Libertadores is completely unpredictable. The parity is remarkable, and groups are decided on their last day.

With the Champions, before a ball is kicked you can already project the quarter finals. With Libertadores, groups are often decided in the last five minutes of the last day, when the two last games are played simultaneously.

It makes for an amazing soccer experience.

 

European CL is like this due to the fact, that current UEFA cup system promotes richest clubs, and these are getting even richer at much faster rate, than other clubs can. It is just almost impossible to keep up to Real, Barca and Bayern. Maybe Juve and Atleti can jump this wagon, or Chelsea and City (with help of sugga daddies), in general we may have one or two small surprises (like Monaco, they also have sugga daddy), but for any other club it will be very hard to get to the top, unless, some rich daddy helps out.

 

Lets not get into the relegation promotion thing in this thread. Save that conversation for another thread dedicated to it.

 

I find it interesting how some people on this board think is ok for the American media to ignore MLS and to annoy us with EPL everywhere.

Until the mentality and culture changes, no way we win a World Cup.

MLS should have entered Libertadores a long long time ago by the way.

 

I have a feeling MLS teams would do better than expected in Libertadores. They have a style so different, based on physical assets more than individual skill, that I see them putting many South American teams to the test.

Of course, the most team-oriented clubs would put our MLS teams to the sword.

 

Any details why aren't we in Libertadores? Who makes these decisions?

The sooner we join Libertadores, the sooner we start creating a soccer powerhouse.

 

Are you kidding? No team in MLS would currently stand a chance in Copa Libertadores, especially against the Boca Juniors and River Plate-quality teams of South America. It would be like the way the Dream Team mauls everyone else in Basketball at the Olympics.

MLS teams regularly get their clocks cleaned against Mexican clubs. You can forget about MLS winning ANY competitive matches in Argentina or Brazil, especially Argentina.

 

Mexican teams do well in Libertadores.

So what if they don't win? They have to start somewhere.

 

What is the flight from NY or Chicago to Buenos? Something like 11 hours? From London to Almaty is like 9 hours, and I think from Reykjavik would be even longer, if these were to play in UEFA competitions together... But those would be on occasion, so maybe it would be possible for US team to play a game in Argentina as well.

 

I like watching MLS, EPL, Bundesliga, ligamx and I have no idea what the media is up to. Aside from watching live games I hardly tune into ESPN, FS1 or whatever other source is out there.

I'd like to see MLS clubs do consistently well in mexico before they go to S.A

 

Wait another 10 years?

They need to get on Libertadores if they can as soon as possible.

 

Why on earth would Conmenbol invite MLS team to join Libertadores? Frankly, an MLS team would not increase the game level (at this point at least). So, how much more $$$ would an MLS team brings to Libertadores? I think you need to start beating Mexicans teams in a regular fashion to get an invite on merit. But the problem with Libertadores for MLS is the traveling distance. Maybe CONCACAF should approach Conmebol and propose a Americans Champion League or something, this would be better for everyone involved

 

MLS teams would get embarrassed in Libertadores simply because they wouldn't care. If MLS teams use their B teams for the CCL than they are really not going to care about a Champions League on another continent at least a continent that's not Europe.