Why do the vast majority of people gravitate towards anything Apple(even at higher prices) instead of other brands? It's not as if these other-brand products do not perform as good as Apple products. If you can answer this question then you'll have your answer. (Hint... it's a perception problem. Most people want to associate themselves with the "top dogs", with winners. And the sporting "powers-that-be" in the US do not deem the MLS to be perceived as one of the "top dogs").
Neutrals have many more options to watch than MLS, leagues with better quality. It is different than NBA, NFL were we have the best players in the world, so unless you are invested with a local team then watching MLS is seen as inferior to watching better leagues. Now I watch lots of football so inferior quality does not affect me personally that is why I can sit and watch NASL and FMF D2 soccer with no problem. So Ipod vs MP3? Well it will get worst in Minnesota; you do not only have to deal with Eurosnobs but also MLSsnobs that won't support a D2 team.
But MLS has things to offer that foreign leagues don't always have to offer. Just a few examples are game times (an evening slot), lots of homegrown talent, and this is soccer being played in their own back yards for God's sake. I suppose I'll kill this rant here because a) I don't want you to think I'm taking it out on anyone here because I'm not. You all obviously care enough about MLS' well being because you're posting in the MLS TV Ratings thread, and b) This is after all the MLS TV ratings thread so a quick apology for derailing it. I suppose it's just nothing I'll ever come to understand. I love this sport wherever it's played, and I hope to one day tell my son that my generation helped establish the incredible league that MLS is inevitably going to become. Thanks for everyone's time.
I think your question is really the same as why it has traditionally been so hard for soccer to gain a foothold in the US while it pretty much dominates around the rest of the world. Of course the US is unique in that it has its own massively successful domestic leagues in other sports but that does not explain why soccer has never threatened to be one of them. I am now going to ramble on in that uniquely unqualified BS way about some of the socio-political factors that may come into play. I make no claim as to the legitimacy of my thoughts and apologise in advance to those who find my presumptions irritating. I am painting with a very broad brush here but it seems there is/was something in the American psyche that wants/ed to culturally reject something from outside the US as alien and inferior - a phenomenon which has always fascinated me since America is a country made up of immigrants and many of the pieces of popular culture it has are largely assimilated from other cultures and re-branded as American. Perhaps it comes from the USA's unique need to manufacture a strong national identity after the war of independence which was reinforced after the civil war since it had no identity it could use to define and unite its people before that. Perhaps I should leave that to the historians and sociologists though. I think to some extent the fact that MLS has found a niche to cling on to tells the story of how American society and that psyche is changing. For whatever reasons it seems Americans are beginning to look outward more than ever before and open up to other cultural influences without feeling the need to Americanize (sanitise) them first. Indeed the way MLS has actually found success by moving away from this Americanization is quite interesting in that respect. Compare MLS fans and the league with faddish success of the NASL which was all about razzmatazz and Americanising the sport we can see that the NASL's brief success was built on hype and the bubble was sure to burst while MLS is built on the merit of the sport itself. Of course I still recognise the NASL helped pave a smoother path for MLS as the fall out from it was that there were a generation of Americans who had been exposed to the sport proper, most would simply sniff and get on with watching the "real" sports again but some would become fans for life and look forward to the day America had a bona fide professional soccer league - some are undoubtedly BS members and watch MLS with their kids. Perhaps you as an individual are more culturally exposed to this change, should it not simply be a product of my imagination. This may explain why there are soccer hotbeds while in other parts of the US soccer is as reviled today as it ever was. Of course it may be that the successful MLS markets are as much a fad to this generation as the NASL was to that generation but my view is there a fundamental shift taking place, time will tell of course. Americans will know better than I if there is any likely correlation between the perceived cultural attitudes/values of specific demographics within the US and any predilection for particular sports.
I think a couple things are going on. First, Garber has said in the past that a good chunk of the national TV audience comes from the markets of the teams involved. Because of this, well - supported teams at the gate tend to also generate good ratings on TV. (There's a youtube video out there somewhere of him talking to a supporters group where he makes the point that Seattle, not LA, tends to bring the biggest audience.) Second, big markets are fickle and small markets are still small. I've mentioned Craig Coenen's book on the NFL before, but he makes the point that it took decades for the NFL to develop to the point where fans in large cities (deemed crucial to the league's future success) supported their teams regardless of their record. Typically, teams in big cities drew well when they won, but the audience evaporated when the team performed poorly. Some 60 years later, I think MLS is much the same. Sure, in places like Portland an MLS team may be perceived as what Coenen calls a "civic asset" (or Garber calls "relevant") where support is less dependant on the team's record, but in big cities like Chicago or New York I think viewership sinks like a stone when the team isn't doing as well. You can see it at the gate, and I think you can see it in the ESPN ratings. Unfortunately, small markets that are more supportive (and forgiving) are also small TV markets, so they provide less of a boost to the national rating. Third, the motivation of fans in non-MLS markets is different than the motivation of fans watching their hometown team or rival. For those of us who live too far away to get to MLS stadiums with regularity, it's harder to overlook quality issues when a better game is a click of the remote away. Sure, there is nothing like watching your hometown team live at the stadium, but if that's not part of equation viewers tend to judge more on what they are seeing on TV. I've noted before, it's a hard strategy if MLS has to convince people they must watch games out of a sense of moral obligation -- this is supposed to be entertaining, after all. And while some MLS teams can be very entertaining IMO, thanks to the parity rules few manage to produce high quality on a consistent basis, which makes it harder for casual fans to follow -- especially when a good team is from a small market and doesn't get much national attention. I don't think it's coincidence that if you look at ESPN3 or Fox Soccer Plus most of the games from Portugal, the Netherlands, France or Scotland beamed into the U.S. feature the big, historically successful popular clubs because they appeal to a broader audience. MLS has chosen a different path. Building a national audience is hard. It took the NFL years. But it starts, I think, in the stadiums. Fill them up. Use that money to get better players. Those who can't get into the stadiums will watch their hometown heros on TV, and the rest of us will hang around longer the more compelling the story and the more the locals seem to care. The ratings will come. Eventually.
I don't know how true this is today, in general, but in the past it has struck me often how snobbish soccer fans can be in this country. Perhaps it is an element of the counter-culture nature of soccer. Perhaps the really knowledgeable fans truly do not want to waste their time on mediocre MLS (which is now better than many give it credit for). But also I believe there is a degree of counter-culture hangers on that are attracted less to the "game" of soccer, and more to the anti-establishment nature of it. Without the deep knowledge, it is easy to paint yourself as knowledgeable if you reject the supposedly inferior product in favor of EPL.
I live in L.A. and have never found a single person to talk about MLS with. I can find people to attend games with, but nobody will follow when they aren't at the stadium.
It's a throwback to the time buy days, and a TERRIBLE time slot for our matches. There are so many things I can do on a beautiful Saturday afternoon, and none of them involve sitting inside and watching TV. We've been here before..circa 2003. This is a step back as far as I'm concerned. 7PM is a good time slot, it's right around dinner, too early for the bars or clubs and a decent way to pregame. We are not the NFL, we do not have a Sunday tradition. If ESPN was serious about promoting the league, we would not be taking up the bowling slot at 4 PM on a Saturday. The ratings suck this year on ESPN, period. A big part of that reason is the time slot.
I wish there were one day of the week where I could plan on watching an MLS game. Having to wonder if the game is going to be on a Sunday, Friday night, or mid day Saturday is a pain, and I end up missing one or two because of it.
And a big part of the worse time slot on ESPN is the poor ratings even in good time slots. When the MLS gets more popular, they'll get better time slots.
"I watched the wrong channel" "I wish games were not on during a Saturday afternoon" "I wish the games were on the same time slot every week" etc etc etc So many comments in this thread make me feel like it is 1999 before DVR's came into use.
That is not the point. You don't have to miss a single game if you don't want. Missing games is nothing but excuses. It's not that hard to avoid an MLS score in the news.
You'd have a point if they moved the time slot on the deuce. The flagship games drew pretty decent ratings by soccer standards last year.
ESPN isn't Fox Soccer. It broadcasts all kinds of sports. Sports that get good ratings by a real standard.
For those of you in that time zone. 7 PM ET is a craptacular time slot for those of us in the Mountain and Pacific Time Zones.
Yeah, 9 eastern is the best national time slot you can have for sports, especially if it falls on a work day.
It's all relative. According to Kenn Tomasch's blog, CBS had 10 million viewers for Pele's first game with the Cosmos. A NASL game the following year had 3.3 million viewers, yet CBS didn't continue with games. ABC in 1979-81 had ratings in the 2.6 to 3.1 range, yet declined showing games due to the "dismal" ratings. This was in the day when most only had three or four channels to choose from or very little cable TV, no Web, no mobile phones. Back in 1979 when ESPN first got going it was, "Wow! 24/7 sports?" Now there's tons of sports-related channels, including more than one soccer channel. Hundreds of cable/satellite networks, online video, Web and mobile and a busier society all competing for viewers' time and attention. Beckham's debut for LA against Chelsea in 2007 got a 1.0 for ESPN and that was hyped to no end. His following game on ESPN against DC United was just a 0.4 (granted, he only played as a sub with that nagging ankle injury.) MLS would kill for those old NASL ratings. But it's a niche league in a niche sport in a crowded media landscape. 0.2s and 0.3s for league games and 0.8 for MLS Cup in this day and age is not horrible. Even if MLS became EPL level, what would the ratings be in this era of TV?