I know, I’m an ex-pat too, just ex-patriated a long, long time ago. I can’t speak to the City game, but the Tottenham game was midweek at 6pm and while it didn’t have the mass attendance of a United or Madrid caliber game, there were considerably more people there than any mid-week Galaxy game. Would they come week-in, week-out? Maybe, but clearly they haven’t in any sufficient number – and as much grief as I give the plastic fans to our north, 17,500 season tickets says there are at least some reasonably invested soccer fans out there the Galaxy failed to court.
While the Clippers are almost literally in the Lakers' shadow, I doubt the Times would describe them as being in the shadows of the sports landscape or that L.A. doesn't care about them. fwiw Clippers average attendance is less than 17K Last year after a dip of about 3K, we were at over 22K average
Did anyone else hear that a big chunk of their season tickets were "bought" by the club to give to corporations and AYSO teams in an attempt to boost their sales numbers? It was something I saw brought up on Twitter (not saying it's true since I only saw it on twitter). Just curious.
And when I raised it to Chris Thomas on Twitter, he simply applauded their success and assured me we'd have a higher average attendance. I agree with you that we could and should be doing more.
That is BS. A winning team is the main thing that would help bring back the fans. Or another star closer to his prime (say Ronaldo for example). Zlatan is a nice addition, but far from our last hope.
I still don't understand this signing. Is there really that big of a Swedish community in LA to pander to?
You have some good points which I agree with, but conveniently omit some of the great moves the Galaxy have made, including Alessandrini, Lletget, Kamara and Jonathan do Santos. These are all outstanding MLS players in their prime. Gerrard and Gio were busts and done for the wrong reasons, and Gerrard is gone. So it really just comes down to Gio. Bringing in Zlatan is nothing like Gio because 1) Zlatan is not a DP, 2) we aren't counting on him to be THE MAN on the team, and 3) he is much cheaper than Gio. Zlatan is a nice, low-risk addition that might bring some good short-term excitement and offense.
The issue for me comes down to stadium location. Carson is NOT the ideal place for a soccer stadium. Soccer in the US, at a pro level, has shown to attract people that live in cities most of all. Due to the new urbanism, young professionals are moving back into cities in droves and they are the main audience for MLS (as shown by research). LAFC is doing well because they positioned themselves near their major audience and the Galaxy did not. If we want the Galaxy to work and attract HUGE numbers in attendance (which i personally think they can) the stadium should be built near downtown LA. LA can support 2 teams and the stadiums can be around downtown together. We could always try the Rose Bowl again as a test as well.
No they are staying. Kamara has looked good and I want him to stay. Gio can leave but I doubt will, since that means we probably lose JDS too. I hope Sigi benches Gio and maybe that will light a fire under his ass and create REAL competition for positions (which is the best way to elevate a teams performance). I would like to see JDS moved up into a playmaker position with Kamara and Ibra in front of him. Gio can come in late for Zlatan and hopefully can prove he deserves to start. Now for our defense... :\
As I explained on the overall MLS forum, he was signed via the little-known Off-Budget Scandinavian mechanism (or "Oh BS!" for short). EDIT: Screw it. As nobody has made the joke yet... he'll be playing at right back!
They weren’t germane to the point I was making which is LA is a one-trick poney when it comes to relevancy.
Well, like I said, it's convenient to leave out the other side of the story that suggests they aren't a one trick pony, to bolster your argument that they are.
Agree. Except the part about the Rose Bowl. That would be the worst thing they could do! Ignoring the 60,000 empty seats that would blight the games, that's probably an even worse location than Carson.
Eh, it's close to downtown and it's a good test for big matches. Galaxy vs LAFC should be at the Rose Bowl and you can see how many people show up supporting the Galaxy. I've heard the Galaxy has very good TV ratings in the LA area so clearly there's a disconnect with TV and live audience.
Ok... THIS is what I hate: https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2018...laxy-officially-announce-ibrahimovics-arrival "LA... Welcome to Zlatan"
The stadium is LITERALLY 15 minutes down one freeway from the location you covet. Give me a break with this stadium location BS. It's not like the stadium is located in Westlake Village or something like that.
The one thing that I don't understand is the fact that LA is the winningest team in MLS history, and yet the press and greater public still treat the club like a joke. I know people argue that the club has just bought big-name players to pad the roster, but that stretch under Arena was pretty damn good in terms of developing talent through the youth system, bringing in little-known foreign players, drafting great guys out of college, picking up useful journeymen from other teams, AND paying top-dollar for big-name guys (not to mention Donovan, who was kind of a unicorn). So is your point that the club is crap at marketing, or that over-all management sucks? Either way, what do you think the club should do (maybe we need a different thread for this).
You’re misunderstanding what I mean by one trick pony. You’re talking about building a team, I am not.
Well, I for one can't wait for the back-to-back Cups The Zlatan will bring us and then on his way out the door announce the plans for the HZB(the House Zlatan Built) in the west corner of Dodger Stadium parking lot. /s...or is it?
Their marketing is crap. I mean that’s just objectively true regardless of my opinion about the quality or professionalism of the department. Ultimately the goal of marketing is to sell product and they haven’t; they’re dependent on big names to sell tickets. As for the larger point, I genuinely don’t know. It was a good strategy in 2007, I’m not sure it’s as good a strategy in 2018 and I’m definitely convinced it’s an unsustainable one over the next 5 years. Like I said there were signs last year management recognized the need to adapt, they just botched it and reverted to what worked in the past. If it’s stability move, great. If it’s because they don’t know how to execute that pivot then not so great.
Did the league or the Galaxy have difficulty trying to find a stadium location within LA city limits back then? Maybe that's why they settled for Carson. It's not an ideal location for a lot of fans but it does draw people in especially when the Galaxy are winning.
Absolutely yes. Building a soccer stadium was not something that any city or local government was very supportive of back then. MLS teams had to do the best they could to prove the concept of a soccer specific stadium was even viable. That's why Columbus Crew stadium is so low-frills. Compared to that, the Home Depot Center was a fricken palace. The difficulty in building these things is why so many MLS 1.0 teams have stadiums in non-ideal locations. Colorado in Commerce. Chicago in Bridgeview. Dallas in Frisco.