I know its early, but so far I haven't been too impressed with our local media. First off, the day of the Kreis announcement two out of the four local channels didn't pronounce his name correctly. (Crease instead of Kreis) Not to mention Fox didn't even send a camera to the press conference. But I was ok at that point because at least channels 5,4 and 2 did show up and show some of the press conference. However, I lost some faith this weekend. Yes, I realize the U of U victory took most of the local coverage. But I didn't see any coverage of the Expansion Draft at all. Did any of the four channels even mention it? Did any radio mention it? (I haven't listened to any sports radio lately)
It could be worse. My brother said he heard some RSL talk on the radio and it wasn't "Will this be viable" but stuff like "they got such-and-such player who has been good" so that's a positive sign.
That's not too bad, really. For a team that has yet to even train together. Lots' of teams get little if no recognition even if they are going to the leagues playoffs. Wait until the local "Anti-Soccer" reporters start doing pieces, they are always a ton of fun.
That will be interesting. It seems like a lot of the anti-soccer voices are being silenced right now. I suspect they have a fear of being the one TV/radio/newspaper entity that will end up "out of the loop" on something really great. They're all holding their breath (and their criticism) to see how things turn out for the team before they start digging their teeth in. At least that's how I see it.
I'd say the anti-soccer guys here are more likely to stay out of it because it's Dave Checketts, who is probably greatly responsible for many of them even having jobs. Everybody said the Blitzz would fail (except Gordon Monson BTW. I distinctly remember him saying they would be succesful in a tv discussion while every other guy there said 2 years tops) and they proved them wrong. They are a lot less likely to say RSL will fail when they've got Dave Checketts backing them up and the Blitzz showed that soccer can work. As montgjules said, they'd also be left out if this thing gets big. I'd expect to see a few radio and tv call in shows have segments where they let guys call in and bash soccer, but I think the journalists themsleves are going to just avoid the subject altogether until this thing either completely proves itself as a success or a failure. Then they'll jump in and pull a Lee Corso and say they knew it all along.
i think the best solution to get RSl's name out there is to do a College F*** Fest video with the guys weraing RSL jerseys and then many younger college students will realize theat RSL is everywhere...it will be a hip thing to go to class with a soccer jersey....we all know how much guys in college watch porn. Hell im 30 and i still do
I think you peaked at post 98 or so. -------- Print media has been good. Radio has been UU-BYU, UU-BYU, Crowton's gone, UU-BYU, Meyer's gone, UU-BYU, Jazz, Lee Corso, UU, Meyer's gone, BYU, etc. ad nauseum Hopefully we can break into the airwaves before April 2-March madness. I haven't watched network tv news since the open house. Mis Padres said they saw the list of RSL draftees on local tv.
Considering all the sucess the Utes have had this season i can understand RSL being "not the hot topic" at the moment. I wouldn't worry about it in Salt Lake your owner practicaly runs that town..as they said earlier I don't see many people wanting to publicly critisze the man they may well have hired them, and the man that just brought only the city's second major pro franchise to town. Of course this doesn't mean there is gonna be papperatzi outside Mathis mountian villa either...no wait...that just might happen.
Anybody tough enough to live in Butte in the winter can post anything he wants. Foreigner is on the right track. But if similar businesses in Australia can sponsor rugby teams, certain establishments in rural Nevada can sponsor RSL. "You can't score on DJ Countess, but you can score at the Bunny Ranch." Has anyone seen any news in Spanish yet? I have not heard anything on 1640. But they don't have a lot of local sports news.
I would guess that there would be less anti-soccer stuff in Salt Lake City because it's a thrill just to get a pro sports team there. Columbus is another city pretty much ignored by pro sports teams, and you never see any soccer bashing articles there. I don't know how it was back in 1996 there but it couldn't have been worse there than the other nine cities.
The Blitzz got fair treatment, just not much of it. The real secret of a teams success are fans who want to see their opponets play. Look at what the Yankees do to other teams home attendance or what a Home Run leader does for the opponents attendance. 11/12 of the Soccer Players you will see during a season play for your opponents. Salt Lake Soccer fans ("Fans" means people who actually know something about the game and read/submit to forums, play, coach, ref, volunteer as well as buy tickets) are being short changed by the local media. How? We are told nothing about the other teams and players in the MLS. Who in the TV sports channels in Salt Lake could identify a MLS player who plays similatly to Jorge or Guti? Talking heads, confetti, and ribbon cuttings don't build fan knowlege and support; real information about players the game as well as opponent news does. Hint to Newspaper editors: Let the reporters actually report soccer, the guys know the game, but are squashed in the technical information the are allowed to present and the space to do it!
I'll have to say that the print media has been great. During the second half of the season you could find the league standings in the 'Scoreboard' of the Sports section. Fairly regularly you could find small recaps of league games. I say bravo to the local papers! They have been a descent source of team information. I can't speak for the tv coverage. Mainly because i can't opine about what i don't have.
I was visiting family out in Utah and was shocked to see coverage of the league. That had never been there until the team was announced. That alone is a start. Also if I remember right one of the morning radio guys on KFAN used to play some soccer possible A-league or PDL? I don't really remember where but maybe he will do some coverage?
I've found those soccer bashing articles have really decreased in recent years. Now talk radio, that is the current media of the soccer basher. When ever soccer comes up there it is always bashed.
The morning KFAN guy played indoor I believe. He is also part of the cheesiest, laugh-at-our-own-jokes shows in market.
That's CNN's fault. I work at Fox, and we spent the whole afternoon trying to verify the correct pronunciation. CNN sent a script down the wires with a pronunciation of Krees. It actually made me doubt that I was right in thinking it was pronounced like Christ without the t. It wasn't until well after 9, when CNN finally sent down video of Kreis that we were able to know for certain. I guess I should believe in myself more. I don't know how we pronounced it on the show The sports folks around here are pretty clueless about soccer. I'm trying to educate them a little, help them out a bit. Mike Runge told me, the day that the team was announced, that he was once asked to commentate a local soccer game. He started out, "so and so kicks off to so and so," and then sat there for a few minutes...he had absolutely no idea where to go from there. Nothing of consequence seemed to be happening. It was beyond his knowledge of sports. But I think the fault may lie with the team as well. When the expansion draft happened, I showed up at work, noticed that it wasn't on the sheet of things we planned to cover during the day, and asked Megan West if they were going to cover it. She seemed surprised that there was something going on. Was it a big deal thing, she wanted to know. Was it on TV, she wanted to know. She ran into the sports office and started rolling on ESPN News. Thanks to my intervention, we ran a little story that included video of Andy Williams and DJ Countess, and a soundbyte from Ellinger. So I know that at least we did cover it. I tried to get them to send a camera to the Loyalists party at the Skybox, and they sounded like they were all for it, but then they never sent anyone, so I don't know what was up with that.