Label MLS "The Most Entertaining League in the World"

I like Liga MX too, but what's marketing without a little hyperbole? Regardleas, MLS closely resembles Liga MX in format, which is one of the reasons both leagues are so entertaining.

 

Everyone else is coming up with things to discuss.

To have my assumptions challenged. To have someone I disagree with explain to me why I'm wrong.

When I'm challenged, I back up my ascertains. I don't hide behind the bullshit "oh, it's just my opinion, man" reasoning. Might want to try that.

 

So in all of yours' opinion, why is MLS seen as less "entertaining?"

I ask because I am a soccer noob and am trying to get a handle on what the league needs to do to up it's game. I remember many a soccer fan at college who scoffed at MLS in comparison to their preferred English club.

I tried taking a look at various leagues to compare, one thing I noticed is that when I watch certain premier league games, the game is played with much more space allowing for midfield passing and movement, same with Liga MX.

When I go back to watch my DC United, there is a lot of counter attacks and long ball. Play is also a lot more physical from what I've seen in European and Mexican games. I've read posts in "The Road from Here" comparing general tempo, rates of completed passes and such between MLS and other leagues.

Is that what constitutes the smell test that MLS has to pass? Is it a lack of skilled position players in our talent pool?

 

Yeah, those were some great discussion points...Mine wasn't even in the neighborhood...Thanks for the advice.

And I do when its relevant. This thread is all about quips and opinion of what is most entertaining (see: all the posts that you apparently think are "things to discuss").
IMO, the most entertaining leagues are leagues where the talent is balanced. They have both quality attackers and defenders. Basically, entertaining means more talent not 'we spend money on offense and pay our defense $50,000 a year so we score more goals, yah we are entertaining'

 

I watched about a half of a Liga MX game on ESPN in English. God this was a stupid setup. The commentators spoke English as a second language, so were somewhat difficult to understand. I think it's a very small demographic that would prefer to watch Liga MX in English instead of Spanish even if it was well-produced. It's much more enjoyable to watch Liga MX in Spanish (my distant second language).

 

There's very little in that smell test. A lot of the people scoffing at MLS follow superclubs that have major international stars in all 11 positions in their lineups. They're fans of big names rather than fans of the game, or just like to bask in the reflected glory of a team that is an overwhelming favorite in almost every game it plays. Yes, players in the top European leagues have better technique than MLS, but they still have a bunch of teams whose styles of play are as ugly as MLS's worst.

 

Yes, people enjoy watching the best playing..The horror...

 

Funny that it's never the Hull City fans scoffing at MLS, though. When American soccer fans who won't give MLS the time of day talk about Europe, they're always referring to clubs like Barcelona and Bayern Munich, and not the opponents that they play against week-in and week-out in their domestic leagues. In that sense, "more entertaining" appears to mean being overwhelmingly better than the opposition.

 

Or when those teams play each other?

Hull City is more talented than every MLS team so a game between them and say Stoke City is still a better display of soccer than a game between the Sounders and Galaxy.

I'd argue Hull City vs. Manchester City is a better display too despite the knowledge that Hull City won't win the EPL, the individual matches are often quite entertaining. I'd be an EPL fan but I don't give a damn about any of the teams. In MLS I care about the Sounders, I'd love to have better soccer with a rooting interest.

 

This isn't an American issue or a soccer issue, it's how sports fans across the board generally think. Think NBA fans in Europe spend time talking about the Bucks or Jazz, or do you think they get up to watch Lebron or Durant? Think Japanese or Cuban MLB fans talk about and stay up to watch the Twins or the Rangers, or do you think it's more the Yankees? Do more causal NCAA basketball fans, aside from watching their alma mater, get excited about Duke or Kentucky, or do they talk about Boise St?

If the average sports fan wanted level playing fields and close to evenly matched competition, talent be damned, HS sports, even youth sports would be much more popular. Just go watch your local HS football team play. Yet, they don't. Ratings across sports internationally show it's talent/quality the average fan gravitates towards. They want to see the stars, just as when some of Hollywood's top actors and actresses come out with a new movie, theaters are full. When it's a B movie....not really. And it they loved acting for the true art of it, rather than the entertainment and seeing the best perform, local stage theaters and the independent film industry would be doing a helluva lot better.

But society at large has spoken. It's quality and talent they want to see.

 

I find La liga games entertaining, and I mean games outside Atletico / Barca / Real M.

Then again I am weird; I find CCL games entertaining even if they are games between Tauro and Metapan.

But over all you are right, people want to see super stars so they gravitate to the super clubs.

But there is also some cultural elements, Fans of local leagues will still follow their local leagues even if they do watch the super club match ups in Europe.

Be it fans in Argentina, Mexico, Netherlands, Japan, etc.

 

Well similar to following your alma mater even if they are not a big college team, sometimes fans do follow lower teams if they have players from your national team.

I mean more Americans probably watch Sunderland or Stoke than they watch Hull city, because they have USA NT players.

Shit, Univision Deportes Network went out and purchased the Spanish language rights to the French D1, just because Memo Ochoa was playing in one of their shittier teams.

 

Exactly. Really, I don't think the quality point is even seriously being debated anymore. A central component of the league's 2022 plan is to improve the quality of play.

It wasn't always so.

In 2008, Robert Wagman wrote a terrific op/ed piece in Soccer Times entitled, "Unable to afford excellence, MLS instead seeks parity." In that piece, he wrote:

"MLS has always used the salary cap as a bludgeon to promote parity in the league. From its earliest days, MLS seemed to have an annual choice -- whether to bring the bottom of the league up to the same quality as the best in the league, or to bring the best back to the middle of the pack. To do the former would obviously cost money. So, inevitably, the latter course was chosen and the weapon of choice was the salary cap."

http://www.soccertimes.com/wagman/2008/jan14

Yet, even as Wagman was writing that, it's now clear that MLS was changing. I've noted in some other posts that nearly half of total payroll dollars are now paid outside of the salary cap, and many of those dollars are flowing to designated players. Six years later, I think the narrative has evolved.

What is and will be debated now is how much investment is needed to improve the quality, and how balanced that investment must be.

The DP rule was really used to create a coalition of the willing. It allowed more payroll spending without mandating it from every team. The DP slots were limited to keep some semblance of parity -- a speed governor if you will -- but if the league continues to add more DP slots as exceptions to the cap, at some point it's likely to make the league less competitively balanced between the spenders and the frugal. The DP payroll exceptions will swallow the hard salary cap rule.

The league is moving into uncomfortable territory. If Wagman's correct that the pre DP MLS was about tightly controlled payroll spending and bringing "the best back to the pack", and the current DP era was a recognition that the league couldn't and shouldn't hold back the teams that wanted to spend more completely, the next phase is going to be how much to demand from teams that simply don't want to spend more.

I think that may be far more contentious, but if the parity rules are to hold, they can't be based on the lowest common denominator IMO.

 

I get your point, but as a Rangers fan I must draw your attention to Yu Darvish. Many Japanese make a big effort to watch his games.

Not necessarily. I've seen some awful games (not entertaining and not well-played) in EPL, La Liga, Bundesliga, Serie A, etc. that were worse in every aspect than some MLS games I've seen. Certainly the talent levels are superior in the top European leagues, but that doesn't necessarily ensure a better game than MLS.
For example the FC Dallas v Seattle game last week was better IMO than the Athletic Bilbao v. Granada game I watched the weekend before. The MLS game had some good goals, skillful play, and was very competitive until late in the game. The La Liga game featured a total of one goal, scored early when a Bilbao defender stumbled over the ball to give up a breakaway. The rest of the game was Granada bunkering in.

 

While I agree with your general points, there are always exceptions.

I live in Japan. I watch the news and sometimes the MLB scores will lead the results of the local pro league, which is fairly popular in it's own right. Japanese media follows any team that has a Japanese player on it, this is true for Baseball and Soccer.

Frankly speaking, in a way it's good that America doesn't create superstars who go off to superclubs, then you'd probably have an ever tougher road to haul if you were MLS. At least, when it comes to media time and sports fan's mindshare anyway.

 

That's good for MLS, but if you root for MLS and the USMNT wouldn't you want Americans on superclubs and the USMNT to be a contender to win World Cups even if that meant the quality of MLS was worse?

 

I do, but only if they get regular playing time on their superclubs.
I see far too many "did not dress" game reports for Americans playing in Europe.

 

You're right.

 

Actually Japanese fans probably watch Rangers because Yu Darvish plies his trade there just like Chinese fans did with Houston when Yao was there.

 

Back in the 80's, Real Madrid matches were broadcast on the Mexican TV because of Hugo ... which is sort of a shame because that Real Madrid had talent coming out of wazoo with Martin Vazquez, Jorge Saldano, Emilio Butragueno, Rafael Gordillo, Michel, et al.

And, speaking of the classics -

 

I personally enjoy MLS more then anything else

 

Entertainment is in the eye of the beholder. Some people found the Jackass movies entertaining. The Romanian league entertains me but I'd hardly claim that it's more entertaining than other leagues. It entertains me because it's competitive, the quality is not world class but it's good enough and I know the back stories of the clubs, rivalries and players.

That's why for example I find MLS more entertaining than Brazilian or Mexican league. It entertains me because the games mean something to me whereas I'm not interested in those other leagues. But when I take a step back and occasionally check out a Mexican league game I can see how enthralling the games can be there too. Soccer is just an entertaining sport. Sometimes I'll watch an NCAA game and be entertained by it. As long as the players are average or above average and the players care about winning and the fans care about winning you have the perfect recipe for entertainment.