San Jose Earthquakes - Seattle Sounders FC U.S. Open Cup (Wed., 6/28) pre/in/postgame thread [R]

Maybe leitch will slot Colvey in and keep him on the main roster

 

I agree 100%....a loss to what will probably be a Sounders "B" team and a loss in front of a large crowd at a game that has been over hyped for a month could spell disasters ......

 

we play 3 intriguing games in the next seven days:

1. trying to win our first US Open game against MLS competition (not to mention new debut for new manager)
2. Cali Clasico
3. end the week against the hot new upstart team

good luck Chris Leitch. GO Quakes.

 

Are you thinking that the Quakes are in the running for a treble this year !?!?

 

Well, they're not eliminated yet!

 

I'm always looking on the sunny side. Even though I could see that the team hasn't been functioning well, I want them to win every game. I may not agree with a lot of the decisions made under the Ancien Régime, but I still look forward to every season with great anticipation, and have been frequently disappointed as the season progressed. Regardless, however, I never miss a game if I can avoid it -- even when we've been eliminated from playoff contention.

 

Not of fan of the midweek games, but I am a Quake fan so if work allows I'll make the trek to the south bay Wednesday.....might be nice to see the team play after whats all been going on the last 24-hours....

 

Mfeka played for Reno in their USOC match and thus is ineligable. Unless I'm remembering wrong he was a late game sub and really a waste since I think the Quakes are really wishing he could be in the gameday 18 this Wed.

 

I just realized that the Ticketmaster account manager is not allowing me to list these tickets for sale. We can only transfer them. Also, if you go to the regular Ticketmaster site, there are no tickets for sale on our side of the stadium (bench side). So apparently the quakes are trying to make Avaya look occupied, even the game isn't being broadcast, as far as we know.

So, anyone want to join us at the game? No charge? 2 seats

 

No TV but game will be streamed on the ussoccer.com site

 

Looking through Wikipedia, the Quakes won against MLS opposition once in Open Cup qualification. 1-0 against expansion Portland in 2011. They have yet to win vs MLS opposition in the tournament proper.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Lamar_Hunt_U.S._Open_Cup_qualification

 

Hehehehe....

 

Plus the team might be mad as hell and could quite possibly stomp the guts out of Seattle and that would be fun to watch for everybody!

 

http://www.ussoccer.com/lamar-hunt-us-open-cup/schedule

 

2 people contacted me about taking my tickets, so no one else PM me, as i'm sure one of them will end up with the seats

 

https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2017...-16-previews-tuesday-and-wednesday-june-27-28

 

I hate Seattle almost as much as LA. Let loose the Kraken!

I don't care what the score turns out to be, but take the shackles off of the kids and let them attack with all the skill they have. No doghouse for any mistakes, just let them express themselves. If Colvey is back, start him and Lima and ask them to rip up the lines and kill the Sounders on the edges. Keep Wondo on the bench and bring him in as a super sub like they did against Sac Republic a few years ago. Seattle lives in fear of him......

 

It looks like the Dallas - Colorado game being played tonight is being held in a closed stadium, the stands are empty...

 

So much for the theory that you just need a good / exciting team to bring in the fans.

 

Dallas' attendance issues are actually really interesting. They have had one of the best teams in the league for several years (among being one of the most entertaining teams). Yet, they don't seem to draw particularly well. Every game I've seen take place in their stadium on TV has not looked full.

I know a lot of people have talked about how out of the way the stadium is from a city center, and that kind of thing. Of course, Dallas also has several other pro sports teams and other options for entertainment, so anything that is slightly inconvenient could sway a person to choose something else. I have no idea how much of an effort the team puts into marketing around the area, so that may be a contributing factor as well. It's an interesting problem for the league to try to solve. It is obviously not good to have a team be as successful as Dallas yet fail to sell out games on a regular basis.

San Jose will likely face similar issues, even if successful. Thankfully, Avaya Stadium is fairly conveniently located, so it's more an issue of awareness in the general population and convincing people they should be going to games. Success will certainly help with that, probably more than anything else at this point in time, but certainly not the only factor.

 

The relative success of MLS in various markets has more to do with the local zeitgeist than it does with wins or losses on the field, or designated player signings. Dallas is not Portland in nearly every respect imaginable.

 

Plus that whole summer league in Dallas thing.

 

"Success" hasn't moved the needle that much here in the past. In the years following their championship seasons I don't recall that the Quakes got a big bump in attendance. What I do think is somewhat toxic to the fan base is home losses or dreary 0-0 home games. So I think it is not so much position in the table per se. It is being somewhat exciting and winning at home. The Quakes could lose every single road game 5-0. The casual fan wouldn't care or maybe even be aware of it; they'd just remember the last time they went to the game and the Quakes were reasonably exciting and won 3-1 and it was fun.

Getting people to come to the games here is a complex stew of factors. Having a proper stadium helps, but there is a lot more to it, and a lot more than just position in the table.

BTW I wonder what affect the new proposed Google-plex will have on Quakes attendance. Certainly it will be a boon to the Sharks as they will be right there. But if the techies decide that Quakes games are cool, or there is a corporate deal with Google, it could factor in. Unfortunately most of the games are Saturday and so they wouldn't be there, though OTOH it is the valley so they might be. Or they could go to a mid-week game and get roped into weekend games if they enjoy it.

 

Sure, I am including home wins as part of success, certainly. I do think position in the table does matter to some degree. I remember a lot of Giants fans just talking about how good the team was in a general sense the year following their first world series win. Obviously, winning a championship also helps significantly, but if a team is good more generally, that often means the odds of winning at home is also fairly high (not in every case, of course).

I think there were a lot of factors limiting the Quakes success. Spartan Stadium was a terrible place to watch a game, for one thing. Also, the league, more generally, was entering a pretty dark period after 2003. Attendance was problematic all over the place, not just in SJ.

I definitely agree that home wins, especially, would go a long way toward getting fans to return. If you can reasonably expect to see some good soccer when you go out, you are more likely to go again, one would assume. In that regard, the Quakes can really only go up, as it doesn't get any more boring the Kinnear's teams, and the results at home have not been particularly good or memorable. I would hesitate to call them bad results, as they tied a bunch and rarely lost by more than a goal, but they were extremely dull the vast majority of the time.

It's hard to figure out how to bring people in. The Giants were fortunate to have a new stadium open, followed by perhaps the best hitter of all time chasing the home run record, then some championship teams. Apparently attendance has been down significantly this year, at least for some games, but that's no surprise given that they are god awful right now. Definitely the championships were the biggest factor in the team's more general success with fans. The number of Giants gear I saw worn around increased significantly following the 2010 win.

The same thing happened with the Warriors. I rarely saw anyone wear Warriors gear prior to the first championship (though I know that team has had good attendance even when they were a bad team), and now it's everywhere. I can't say the same thing would happen if the Quakes won a championship, though I suspect it would have a very similar effect, if not as big. Remember that soccer is less popular at the pro level around here than other sports, and that there are a multitude of teams to watch.

If the Quakes were good while the other teams were slumping, I think that would probably help the most, as it seems fans kind of jump from team to team based on performance (at least that's been my observation). You can't coordinate that, obviously, but it would be helpful.