Wahl is usually a fun, informative read, although it depresses me to think how long it'll be before MLS has grand 'ol profound sports writers who cover the sport, ala Jim Murray for baseball.
Great article title...but I don't buy it...this year the Galaxy gets the monkey off its back...I guess I'm a creationist.
He does make a good point about AEG president, Tim Leiweke's comments. Proclaiming soccer will be the #2 sport in america in 20 years is a comment we just don't need. Not that I think the comment harms MLS at all, but it will be rather annoying trying to ignore anti-soccerites bringing up that statement.
The alleged statements they generally bring up are the ones about an "imminent boom" in soccer's popularity. Given the time frame he mentions, he certainly isn't talking about a boom. 20 years from now I doubt anyone will be concerned with holding him accountable.
I haven't seen or heard these comments brought up anywhere else. No harm, no foul. Personally, such brash talk from someone that high up makes me feel that much better about our future.
I actually found myself thinking the same thing. I remember just a little chatter about his comments somewhere here in BS. But otherwise, no-one seemed to notice. If anything, Grant talking about it threatens to make it more visible. If he'd'a just ignored the question, it'd probably have just gone away. And as long as Lieweke makes it a one-off, it'll stay pretty much ignored. As long as he doesn't pull a Woosnam and make it the center of his platform, we shouldn't have to deal with much more crap than usual from the soccer haters.
He makes a fair point, though I would argue he's got his league's mixed up. The NFL isn't competing with anybody right now. He's missed a few seasons of baseball if he thinks MLB is #1.
in the evolution of sports... it can be think about where tv deals were 20 years ago... baseball was king... nba and nfl weren't too close to it... nhl, nba, nfl, and mlb teams have increased quite a bit in terms of the number of teams who would have thought the nba would be as big as it is now 20 years ago?
20 years ago, the NHL was having trouble keeping their national contract. For several years, there was none, the Stanley Cup Finals were shown on local independent channels, if at all. They then got a contract with USA networks. At one point, they had a "national" contract with Sportschannel America, which at the timecable stations in 4 or 5 markets. The NBA had their Finals on tape delay one year. Now there are differences. College and high school basketball were big so there was always a big potential market for professional basketball , and hockey always had Canada to fall back on. For MLS, though, you could argue that the youth soccer market is (and maybe always will be) a big potential market (replacing college, high school, and school yard hoops) while the Hispanic market replaces Canada as a reliable market. But times are different, so while the NHL and NBA pasts are instructive, history may not repeat itself.
Not me. Are they investing with the expectation that MLS will eventually be the #2 league? If so, that is troubling.
A few points, if I may. Grant makes many solid points, as usual. I would like to discuss two. "St. Phil", from what I've read is very diversified. Qwest didn't make him a Billionaire. It made him a multi-billionaire. He sold off alot of Qwest stock before the market took a major dive, hence making a good bit of coin. He obviously took a big hit, but he is in no shape or form even remotely close to hurting for money. There is always reason to be worried when the main investor, the driving financial force in American Soccer, is having high profile inqueries into possible accounting irregularies. But, the simple fact is if Phil want's to continue spending money on American Soccer, he will definitely have the means to do so. Secondly, at what point did MLB surpass the NFL as the supreme professional sports league in America? Major League Baseball is "America's pass time" in name only. I know, a trival point. I happen to believe that soccer has a big future in American sport. I don't believe that in 20 years MLS will be the number two sport in America. I do think that MLS will be solidly entrenched as one of the "Big Five" and will be a major force on the sports landscape. Hey, a guy can always dream! JG
Maybe I'm reading him wrong but I don't think he's saying that MLB is still the number one sport. Rather, I think he's saying that MLS will have a tough enough time catching MLB for number three, much less the new big two, NFL & NBA. As far as the possible long term harm I think he is overblowing it, like many of you have said, this hardly made a blip on the sports news scene and barring any repetition is likely to just fade away.
Just out of curiosity and not being a prick to anybody here, but I'm curious if anyone knows what the NBA or NHL averaged in attendance twenty years ago? I realize this will probably be very hard if not impossible to find, but for just a personal reason I wonder if it was better then 15,000 (should have been, but the arenas were somewhat smaller then). It sounds like, from what some of you guys have posted, that our current TV contract is better then what NBA had. Not in terms of money, but in terms of getting to see games live. That's something for us to be grateful about. I know media attention was a lot different back then, but soccer doesn't get too much now, so in that regard it might be similar (can't be positive since I didn't really read sports sections when I was eight). While not the same situations exactly, it isn't entirely apples and oranges either. For a seven year old league, MLS is not doing all that bad. Yes, things need to improve and will take years to do it. But I think in 20 years MLS should (at the very least) have expanded to 18 or 20 teams, have a slightly better TV deal, have a lot more SS stadiums, have raised that salary cap and player salaries, and actually be making money. If all of that happens, I will be a happy guy. Plus, the quality of our league (while not on par with the world's best) could possibly be on par with some second divisons or even first divisions. Considering we are not considered a "soccer nation" by too many, that's not bad at all. And we should have a great Cup tomorrow. Whomever wins, I just want to see a good game that sends those 55,000 + home happy for attending. As long as I can enjoy quality soccer in my own country (and occassionally go to see a game live) then I'm happy.
I think that if MLS is successful, 20 years from now it will be among the world's best- I think that here in 2002 we're already on par with any second division league in the world as far as level of play goes (but we obviously lag far behind in league size, infrastructure, media coverage, player development, etc.) I'd say that in 20 years MLS will have either made it bigtime or won't be around anymore. Bigtime means we will have an 18-20 team league, all with soccer specific stadiums, a tv deal that actually brings in some money, salaries that can retain top US talent for their entire careers and bring in excellent foreign players in their prime. Basically a league that is among the top 5 in the world. As far as our rank on the US sports scene, I'd say somewhere around NHL level.
in twenty years the MLS Will look alot different then it does today: The Twenty teams in two conferences will be: Northeast NE--- 68000 (30000) seat Razor DC--- 30000 Seat stadium near RFK NY/NJ--- 30000 Newark Philly--- 25000 seat stadium Rochester-- Pac Park 22000 Central Indianapolis--- 24000 seat stadium Chicago--- 70000 (24000) Soldiers field Columbus--- 28000 seat crew stadium Milwaukee--- 22000 Rampage Minnesota--- 22000 Thunder Stadium South Denver--- Invesco 70000 (30000) KC--- 24000 seat stadium Dallas--- 25000 in mckinney Houston--- (28000) Reliat Stadium 70000 Carolina--- 24000 seat stadium West LA--- HDNTC (35000) San Jose--- New Spartan Stadium 34000 Portland--- 25000 Seattle---(25000) 68000 seahawks San Diego--- 30000 seat soccer stadium Average attendance of 22000
Two cents on the "20 years" comment. I took a handful of friends to the last Quakes game of the regular season, a 27k sellout vs. the Galaxy. Two of them had been to SF Giants games and 49ers games, but never to a soccer match. The things they commented on: - How great the game was, and exciting and well played (neither of them know squat about soccer but they were right) - How many kids were there -- way more kids than at a 49er game or at a Giants game - And one of them said: "In 20 years, these kids will be bringing their own kids to soccer games, but NFL games are boring and too expensive in person. Baseball fans are dying, these kids are going to replace them, but as soccer fans." *** I think the above gives some context that may lend Leiweke's comments some extra weight. There's a whole different situation today for US soccer than in Woosnam's day. There was no infrastructure for soccer growth and development back then. So I've got no problem at all with the "20 years" comment. In fact, I kind of agree with the spirit of it. 10 years ago, I wouldn't have.
Bajoro, I agree with your comments, except I would't count on soccer to be cheaper than the other sports. With smaller stadiums and increased popularity will come rising ticket prices.
Here are some numbers for you from the 82-83 season by team and overall: Atlanta 7,534 Boston 15,167 Chicago 7,343 Cleveland 3,916 Dallas 11,882 Denver 12,105 Detroit 12,733 Golden State 8,323 Houston 7,491 Indiana 4,814 Clippers 3,875 Lakers 15,810 Milwaukee 10,380 New Jersey 12,947 New York 10,703 Philadelphia 15,775 Phoenix 11,356 Portland 12,666 Kansas City 6,843 San Antonio 9,743 Seattle 14,024 Utah 8,679 Washington 8,990 Average 10,220 Pretty amazing. Several teams were in some trouble at this time, especially Cleveland, Indiana, Kansas City and San Diego. The Pacers nearly folded, hosting a telethon on a local TV channel in the early 80s to save the team. The team was saved and attendance bounced back up over 10K the next year. Even then, there were several games where they closed a curtain halfway up the stands in Market Square to create the illusion of a full venue. League wide, average attendance only began to reach 10K in 75-76 and 15K in 1988-89. Twenty years can indeed be a long time in the sports world.
The NHL and NBA were not doing "a lot better than MLS is doing now" 20 years ago. I'd say that the NBA was slightly ahead of where MLS is now, but not by a whole lot. They had a national contract for the playoffs and finals with CBS and had already cultivated the superstar-centric marketing plan (which is starting to bite them in the ass now) that they use today because they had players like Dr. J, Magic, Bird, Kareem, etc. The NHL couldn't even buy any attention from the media until Wayne Gretzky was traded from the Edmonton Oilers to the LA Kings in 1988. Even with the boost in publicity that that move created, the NHL is still not all that far ahead of MLS today. MLS has a television contract with a larger network (ABC/ESPN vs. Fox), and receives higher ratings for its sport's most prestigious tounament (World Cup vs. Olympic tournament) in this country. The only significant advantage the NHL has on MLS is national footprint, imo.
Today's game may be part of the critical turning point for MLS. I hope the game is exciting and well watched on tv. If so, we may be talking 19 years instead of 20.