Bob Luder had the tag-line on the 3 articles about the Wizards and the Cup game. The story on the sports page front was tittled : Hunt amassing hardware. On page 3 top left of the page he had a artricle tittled : Wizards not a big (LA) story. Mid page left column was the wizards note section tittled : Awards go to other clubs. Then mid-page was the continuation of the front page story with a picture of Lamar holdiong the cup from 2000 and letting the fans touch it. Then bottom page 3 had a ad from both the Chiefs and Wizards on the games both being on TV. A lot of coverage for 1 day.
Interesting. Thompson also writes for ESPN the Magazine, and I've liked a lot of his previous work. While this may have been a good "journalistic" essay, it had NO business being in the KC Star, ESPECIALLY on the same day as the biggest game of the season for the Wizards. Like I said earlier, it is just an excuse for an American fan of soccer to snub MLS and head for the greener pastures of Europe. This argument has been made zillions of times. It seems these "eurosnobs," if you so wish to call them, don't realize that MLS fans are aware that the European leagues have better soccer, better players, better atmospheres etc. But this is OUR league, in OUR country, with OUR stars. So damn us for rooting for the teams in OUR cities - rooting for a team in Milan or London or Berlin sure doesn't hold much weight with me. The Star should be admonished for printing such an article, especially on such an important day.
That sounds familiar. From his attitude and his question on the press conference, I got the impression that it was a guy that was rather impressed with himself, but really didn't know - nor care, about the shades of gray that is MLS. He had his story and he was going to find the pieces that fit what he intended to write.
Apparently he's a "reporter"/Eurosnob who used to work at the Columbian Missourian. I hope he wasn't brought in exclusively for soccer, because this was an awfully ignorant piece. This was my favorite. “The real story is that Jamaica or any other nation can put up such incredible competition against the U.S.” And don't forget this tired reasoning for why soccer isn't #1. "We Americans have a hard time understanding an activity where the goal is the journey and not the destination." Why is it always "we" instead of "I" when they claim ignorance?