The one bit of value that exists in that part of the discussion that I otherwise might have moved off as being a complete distraction from the meat of the thread is that it shows you the kinds of mentalities that exist out there that most wouldn't express unless you drug it out of them. I think a lot of the people who don't take this game's potential in this country seriously do so because they think brown people don't count. I believe we'll get over that thinking at some point, and when we do the sport will clear a real hurdle.
actually spanish speaking people come in different shades so how is this racist??? latinos are not a race..... back to the point. like i said Major league soccer needs real creditability, no spanish tv channel can deliver that compared to over the air english speaking network or basic cable channel thats english spaeking and willing to give MLS a shot... MLS is not trying hard enough.. to most american sports fans its Minor league, and to eurocrates its "mickey mouse". Well in appearane any way..... no offense, but C Blanco is only gonna get you spanish headlines for the league, he really wont be a house hold name outside Chicago and Mexican fans. David beckham issue is near border line now, practically a butt of jokes in half of the mainstream sports radio programming. MLS isnt really being taken seriously,.... Not by any Anglophone media group in the United states. ...Sooner or Later MLS and the USSF will learn to get better in selling to the real masses..... the latinos market have already benefit cause its more soccer out there to watch on a channel catered to them. the spanish ratings is only signifigant to them not to the BIG 3 or NCAA or the BIG 4 networks. ABC i think is being nice to MLS with this tv deal now, ofcourse MLS has to work harder to earn thier stripes in the American Market.... Sorry But the Spanish Ratings dont Compare, not on the same zip code bruhh.
So your bigotry's OK because it isn't technically race-based? Got it. Which is why NBC spent $2 Billion to buy one.
Theres someone in this thread who doesnt seem to understand how TV ratings work. Im going to post a completely irrelevant blurb and maybe hell understand. It depends on how tightly those racist goggles are screwed on though. "CBS was third with a 4.1 average for “Two and a Half Men” (4.4) and “Rules of Engagement” (3.8), Univision fourth with a 2.1 for “Destilando Amor,” Fox fifth with a 2.0 for “K-Ville” and CW sixth with a 1.3 average for “Girlfriends” (1.2) and “The Game” (1.4), which built on its lead-in for the second straight week." Univision (and Telefutura) are counted along with any other network. PAX, Telemundo, MyNetworkTV and the other minor ones are also tracked but usually not reported. Perhaps the DC guy will suggest that the viewer numbers should be halved because brown people dont count as much as white people? Why hasnt he been banned anyway.
.....and having reached the end of the thread, I wish I hadn't begun. In my eight years on BS, I've never resorted to the ignore list. That may change. (My favorite? "creditability")
bottom line there is no doubt MLS is catering to the Latinos , i think to make alot of money off, and to survive. like i said the spanis tv ratings only show that latinos like soccer (no secret) they will watch regardless of who, what league, MLS and other Soccer people know that. all im saying Major league soccer needs to step up and try to get better exposure outside the espn/abc thing. and fox soccer channel. they need another outlit to show thier brand. superliga can be shown on another channel for english if mls did thier part. .. for yall people who want to add race to the factor because i sure didnt. then why dont you add BET to the ratings since thats a National network.... yall people should be ashamed of yall selves like MLS soccer you are wimps and refuse to take chances, yall settle on the little worth of a couple spanish channels lololoololoo. if you really think soccer will succeed ,yet alone MLS-superliga which is not really a factor in the CCC maybe a USMex biooootch fest oon a spanish tv well you wont get too far in popularity among the mainstream sports..... why do you think places like Crews staduim are getting a stage and footall yard lines are on the SSS??? because they know soccer is nnot that marketable yet or they can only market so much. and or thats soccer is nOT a year round sport most of the country. whats is the real mission of major league soccer, i think MLS need to check their reality, because to me it looks like they only catering to expats and spanish speakers for thier own satisfaction.
Actually, when that time comes, we might see more USA jerseys at US v Mexico games - without the ethnic demographic in the stadium necessarily being any different than it is today.
Silly me. I saw three pages on a thread about tv ratings and thought I would come in here and find information on the ratings for some of the outstanding games the past few weeks on ESPN2. It would certainly be interesting to know if there is some parallel bump in ratings to match attendance. Having said that, this thread really sucks. Let me ask you something. Have you BEEN to an MLS game lately? The crowds are a great mix of people and are far from limited to ex pats and hispanic audiences. This has been the best year of MLS in so many ways, and you are bitching and making arguments that are six years old and not relevant to the current landscape. Yes, we would all love the Super Liga to be on NBC Prime time must see tv with a 16 rating. Apparently you have never built anything in your life. Superliga was meant to reach a couple of audiences and was meant to legitimize MLS with hispanic Americans. Mission Accomplished. It was the first freakin year! Let them solidify the tournament and then focus on expanding the audience. Every past attempt at a North American format has frankly sucked. CCC actually was much better this year and Superliga blew all past efforts away. You are going to find it hard to convince people that it is not viable because it only appeals to "the latinos." Unrelated to soccer, let me give you a piece of advice. When generalizing about an entire group, its best not to put "the" in front of them. Even if you can come up with examples of where it seems harmless, why even go there. It sounds like when our grandparents (or great grandparents) would say "the coloreds" or worse.
Damn DCUdiplomat. That is the worst overall post (in terms of grammar, punctuation, spelling, following a logical premise, and overall subject) that I have ever seen on a message board. Ever. My dad use to tell me that at the end of the day, people don't care what color your skin is as long as your money is green. Do hispanic people in this country pay with good ole american dollars? They do? Well awesome, looks like we'll be trying to get their business. TV coverage will grow, but you don't just demand air time and recieve it, you have to give the networks a reason to show your programming and if MLS can point to Telefutura broadcasts getting over a million households per game then that is a huge reason for a big 4 network to pay attention.
To try to bring this thread back to a reasonable discussion.... I wonder if the strong ratings on Telefutura would lead an English-language outlet (ESPN, FSC, even Gol TV) to pick up SuperLiga next year? Or, conversely, if it would be carried on Univision (the main netowkr) rather than Telefutura. Either or both of those changes would help in terms of getting the games into more houses and increasing exposure for MLS. And I think the ratings would justify either. The one question is how much Univision is paying for the exclusive broadcast rights in the US and whether they'd pay less if the English language rights are sold seperately from the Spanish language ones.
I doubt it, unfortunately. I get the feeling from the way Univision has spread games to Telefutura and Galavisión that they are trying to get viewers to migrate to those channels. The Tri, of course, stays on Univision but other games get moved around to the other two an awful lot.
Last Friday in Houston I saw a Hispanic man in his 40s cry and hug people around him after the Dynamo evened the aggregate score at the end of regulation. I was amazed how quickly this team has managed to strike the emotional chord with many Hispanic fans, even though there's not a single Hispanic on the roster. At that instant, I wondered how he decided to go to his first Dynamo game. Did he come to see Pachuca when we played them in CCC or Superliga? Or, did he come to see America-Barcelona match? Maybe, the man just likes live soccer and has been a Dynamo fan from day one. There is no doubt that matches against Mexican teams have exposed Houstonians that follow MFL to the Dynamo. And the team has done a great job of retaining those fans by playing attractive soccer and showing a whole lot of heart. Comparing last season to this one, I definitely get a sense of Dynamo being legitimized among Hispanic soccer fans. And that wonderful penalty kick game against Pachuca went a long way to achieve it. So, the Univision ratings don't surprise me. True fans will watch good soccer no matter who's playing. And luckily, SL has been very good soccer so far. We'll see what happens when New England is in it next season
Based simply on observations, I would agree whole-heartedly with this statement. The Dynamo have done a good job of reaching out to the Latino community. No doubt Superliga helped, as BobyOne stated. And I think the league's overall success and visibility also has played a role. It just makes sense that it will be easier for new clubs to win over both Latino and Euro fans in coming years than it was for the trailblazers back in the early days. On a related note, I don't speak Spanish and I watched every Superliga match on television. I don't know how the audience for those matches would divide out but I'm guessing I'm not the only Anglo who tuned in.
not knowing when to use "your" vs. "you're" does not necessarily make one stupid. right, no one but those 2 million tuning in on TF and 200,000 tuning in on ESPN2. but other than those people, nobody. and since that 2 million that hypothetically could watch MLS on TF are doing so on a Spanish-language network, then those people shouldn't count anyway. how is that relevant? the comparison of what people watch in the Canada vs what people watch (or don't) in the US is not a great comparison when the discussion is MLS ratings in the US (be that on English-language or Spanish-language networks here in the US). does the French-language coverage of the NHL in parts of Canada mean that those people tuning in to those broadcasts aren't real fans of hockey either, and they aren't worth recognizing (at least in terms of NHL viewers)?
But why is there a difference at all? Why do you assume that spanish-speaking america isn't mainstream america? Could you please describe for me a "mainstream" american. Plus, if they have money and they will spend said money on MLS, give me one good reason why MLS shouldn't go after that market. Since they're not mainstream, is their money worth less? Is their opinion worth less than a "mainstream" american? Please give me a reason why MLS should stop marketing to a huge portion of the country who generally already follows the sport, and has (on average) a decent amount of disposable income.
you're talking in circles. i recommend you stop looking at the differences between different media outlets and the languages they use, and instead start looking at the similarities. it's all about reaching an audience and bringing in money. it's all a big melting pot. Nielsen measures viewers to television networks. they measure all tv viewers equally (no matter their primary language). if I (were I in the Nielsen sample) watched ESPN2 it would count the same in their estimate as if I watch Univision or TeleFutura. the same would be true for any household (no matter the demographic) in Nielsen's US television sample.
wrong. wrong again. although it would be true if your first statement were accurate. but it's not. also, it's just "MLS", it's not "the MLS". the "the" is completely unnecessary. if you want to sound reasonably informed about the league, then it would help to refer to it properly in your discussions. it needs both (and all) parts of America. Currently the US is populated by about 42.3 Million Hispanic/Latinos. The US population total is about 289.7 Million. so, the Spanish-Speaking percentage of the population is about 14.6%. i'm not sure why "mainstream America" is 10,000 times more important to MLS than that 14% of the population. oh wait, maybe you mean that Spanish-speakers already are part of mainstream America. well, of course, you don't mean that, but if you did, i'd likely agree with you. i can understand your opinions. but i don't agree with them. i'm not sure where you're getting these opinions and what they are reasonably founded upon.
Sportsfan, don't listen to all these people who think they are smarter than you. You know the truth, man. I mean, you properly understand how rigidly inflexible and precisely defined mainstream America is and always has been. What "minorities" do and don't do in this country isn't important, and they don't ever influence the "mainstream." Ever... I mean come on, it's like hip-hop. White kids in the suburbs are never going to start buying rap albums, and MTV is never going to... huh?... oh, wait... what?!... really?...
I've skimmed through some of this thread, but it seems like some people are arguing semantics? Hispanics/latinos are the largest minority group in the US, but they are still a minority group. Although the Spanish-speaking minority group is the largest language minority group in the US, that minority group becomes an even smaller segment of the total population when one considers much of the country does not understand Spanish. Therefore, "mainstream" in the US is English-language programming since most programming in the US is in English. I hope for the day when soccer shares the success that it does on Spanish-language television on English-language television. Since much of the "mainstream" success and often coverage is within a minority group, it does not always receive mass mainstream coverage. Something does not have to be considered "mainstream" by a group if considered "mainstream" by a subgroup. I don't discount Spanish-language broadcasts. I'm not a Nielsen family, but I watch regularly. I may even watch Spanish-language television more than I do English-language soccer broadcasts.... What was the question? //I should have made a chart or Venn diagram