I guess I came from another country so I grew up involved with the sport. Most people on here didn't. When I moved here I got interested in US Soccer from seeing some national team games on tv. I thought they were a pretty good team, mainly because initially I had an attitude that Americans can't play soccer... I was wrong! I grew up loving Arsenal but now I live here I have no problem supporting the US league. It's not perfect but I hope we are heading in the right direction. Even though I lost my Mutiny and I just moved to Tampa to be nearer the games. I will still support the league even though I don't like all head office decisions. When I played in teams, like i said earlier I never really supported pro leagues but now I'm older US soccer is getting the benefit of my want to give something back to the game attitude... So I will support MLS as much as I can.
Don't Give Up I still go on the crusade, and I feel I have made a difference. One thing I have going for me, in the idea of changing the minds of others, is that I am knowledgable about MLB, NFL, NBA, Major College Sports, NHL, etc. I usually start by chatting up these topics, and then, they find out that MLS & soccer in general is hands down my favorite thing. I give them this BS line about, ya man, I went to a game in 96 and was hooked, I used to think it would suck, etc. That part isnt true, but they can relate to it. Back in 2000, I was shocked one day that one of the guys I chatted it up with, that was a sports fan, but not an athlete, joined our conversation. I was being ridiculed by a baseball guy in the cafeteria at work, and this "respected" guy said to my opponent, "anythings better than baseball, I watched some of that "MSL" yesterday and that was some good ************", he was referring to a game in 2000 between the Revs & Crew on a Soccer Saturday and actually remembered a couple of goal sequences. The baseball guy just shut up. I was surprised, that this guy, who always sat with us, was actually listening to me preach the past several weeks, and while surfing, stopped on soccer, and stayed there, something he otherwise would not have done. Too many soccer fans stay in the closet because of Jim Rome's, Mike Wilbons, etc. Come out and show your colors man, we need you. You don't work for the USSF, or MLS, and will never make a dime, but do it anyway. Your still needed. The results will come slow, but they are coming. James
Not exactly. Drunk sane people are also allowed. Seriously, though, think to teams of any sport that you are (or have been) a rabid fan of. What drew you to them was some sense of affiliation. A school you went to (how many college grads still follow their school's sports--most), a team that represents your geographical location, a team whose personality you identify with (the over-the-hill-gang Redskins for me), a team stocked with local heros (my boys of summer Dodgers)--unfortunately a less and less likely attraction in this era of free agency and salary caps. Having played the game isn't probably one of the draws. That's the big disappointment of soccer--all those players and so few of them paying fans. I played little football, but follow the NFL. I played little baseball, but learned to be a fan by going to games with my grandfather. I played basketball through college and am not at all interested in watching it unless it's my college team playing. So what does your own fan experience say for building soccer fandom? The need for more local teams. No local MLS team--fine. There are plenty of A league teams. These should be promoted by MLS and USSF. How many of us who grew up loving baseball never went to a big league game but loved our local minor league team--and followed its players into the bigs? How many of us follow US players in Europe? The need to build the team as the representative of a region. This requires conscious affiliation marketing on the part of MLS. I'm not sure they get it. It also requires using the joint love of the game and the team to bridge cultural gaps among fans so that there is more mutuality and less mistrust in the stadium. Fan groups such as Barra Brava and the Screaming Eagles working together, and La Norte with its open invitation for all to join help a lot. Team support of such groups is a start. The need for local heros. I don't, for instance, see United pushing it's star players (I know--don't even say it). How many other MLS teams consciously build their players into local heros? Baseball, basketball and the NFL have figured that out. Of course, keeping them around has been a problem and, as we found out in DC, can backfire when they leave. But think of an Aikman for Dallas or a Jergenson for Washington. There is a lot more that can be done. I wish I could say I see it happening.
You are correct. I can relate that to where I came from. There were some semi-professional soccer teams so people followed their local teams more than some of the bigger clubs out of their area. It takes work though and it isn't easy for teams to survive.
I think the problem here is the way player is often defined. Basically anyone who kicked the ball around for a year in recreational soccer league. I think if we define a player as anyone who played for at least a high school or serious youth team we would find these players are significantly more likely to follow professional soccer than non players. I do not have statistical evidence, but anecdotally I have found that true. That's why I think a number of today's serious youth players will become professional soccer fans unlike the rec team players of the 70s and 80s. I agree and I think MLS is pretty weak here. I think having one guy own six teams and the single entity structure lead to this. And before I get flamed I do recognize that one guy is the biggest reason we even have a league. I think through there efforts to build a team, owners do a lot to build local interest. Take Mark Cuban as an example. Before him, few gave a damn about the Dallas Mavericks. Now they have an avid following.
I don't know who make up the fan base, but the people who are watching MLS on ESPN2 as of 2001 were: Predominantly male (66.3%) Between 35-54 (34.2%) Household income of $75,000+ (33.1%) College Educated (44%) Children in household (44.4%) Median age 37.5 HH Income Median $58,734 I would find it hard to believe that the people who would watch MLS on ESPN2 would be substantially different in makeup from the people who would go to games, except in extreme demographic cases, which might include Los Angeles.
Thanks for the high praise Northside Rovers! I'm thinking I should stop now before I say something I regret I agree with the sentiment that we need local color and local heroes. I think that this has already begun. Part of what has kept me coming to Fire games is that I know the players. I enjoy watching Nowak, and Stoichkov (mostly on the sidelines). Wolff, Beasley, Razov, Kovalenko, Brown, etc. I love all those guys. I was genuinely bummed when Razov left for Europe, and excited when he returned. I think this world cup has started to build the noise around Donovan, Beasley, McBride (regardless of how much some love and hate him), and Mathis. These are all good starts. It will happen naturally as long as the product offered is quality and exciting.
The problem for professional soccer in this country is twofold: First is that most Americans who know little about soccer (potential fans) only really know about the World Cup. The most common question I'm usually asked is "yeah, when is the world cup its soon isn't it?" To these people club football, which is the norm (the World Cup is very much a special event), doesn't exist. Some people are even surprised to learn that such as professional club football exists at all. Second, those Americans who do have rudimentary knowledge about club football are spoiled. Understand that the US leads the world in its popular sport leagues: MLB is the best baseball league in the world; NFL (by default since nobody else really plays the game); NBA is obviously tops; as is the NHL (the fact that the best players are all Canadians doesn't bother people since the teams are in the States).They know, however, that when they watch MLS, its not even among the top ten leagues in the world, which is something to which many Americans aren't accustomed. That's why in conversations when someone asks, "Well, what about the MLS?" the response is often "Yeah, but thats a sucky league." Its not like these people are Eurosnobs since they probably know little or nothing about European club football, they just know that the best teams and players are not here.
Well, maybe people could make an effort to come and then we can continue to work toward being one of the best leagues in the world. Maybe too many people want instant gratification. I don't know anything about marketing but maybe something along the lines of join us on the road to American soccer success kind of thing!
I've made both of these points many times before on these boards, but here we go again: (1) Soccer bashing DOES matter. Being a sports fan is a communal, not solitary, activity. The only thing that stands between where we are now and professional soccer becoming the fifth major professional team sport in the United States is the certain knowledge of anyone who might be curious about becoming an entry-level soccer fan that he will be subjected to being treated like a nerd by a lot of other guys, probably including his outer circle of friends. (2) Ticket-buyers is a very special subgroup of fans. Season tickets to NBA, NHL and MLB teams are beyond the pocketbooks of even hardcore middle class fans. Crummy seats may be within the pocketbooks of hardcore upper middle class fans. Apart from baseball, tickets are hard to come by for decent teams unless you have access to season tickets. Most NFL, NBA or NHL fans, including probably most fairly serious ones, only go to games (not talk about, read about, watch on TV, but go to games) once a year or so when somebody else gives them a ticket. The ultimate source of those tickets is mostly businesses shmoosing clients and getting rid of the leftovers with employees. Businesses buy those tickets (and not, for example, season tickets to the opera) because they know that typical clients will be impressed and appreciative of something that is popular enough that people know they're supposed to want it. MLS will have hit the big time when half of the people in the expensive seats can't tell the difference between a corner kick and an offside trap, the way that half the people in NFL skyboxes don't know the difference between a strong safety and an intentional safety. Acceptance, like non-acceptance, feeds upon itself.
Definitive proof of intelligent life in genus Soccericus Americanus. Best post on this subject ever. Give the man a shandy.
I hope you're right, but I wonder. I have four children. The oldest two were leaving high school as DC United started. Therefore it was the youngest two who went with me to United games. All played travel and, of course high school. One of the two oldest still plays in adult leagues, yet doesn't like to watch soccer, saying it's boring. The two youngest (one of whom plays in college), who I took to games, are fans. This parallels my own experience with basketball (played through college yet not a fan) and with a study done recently by a university of what builds fans. They found three factors: identification of the team with the community; local sports heros on the team; and fathers who took their kids to games before the kids reached their mid-teens (yes, they specified fathers, not 'soccer' moms). I think there's validity to this study. I think that the kids who are playing also need to learn to be fans. Just because I like to play a sport doesn't mean I will follow it. As others have said, almost 100% of NASCAR fans have never driven a race car. Rabid female fans of the NFL have never played football. The one doesn't necessarily lead to the other.
I think there's validity to that study as well. I also believe in the notion that there is a finite amount of sports "space", not only in our country, but in a given market. It's hard to break in (or fall out) once you're entrenched. There may be some defectors within the community, who replace going to Sox games with going to Fire games for whatever reason, but it's always going to be tough for the Fire to command the kind of respect and sports consciousness that the Bears, Cubs, White Sox, Bulls, and Hawks have. Contrast that with how Columbus treats the Crew. I think that's part of it too.
The fact is that whenever someone says "the fact is" he is expressing an opinion, usually a bad one. I would have thought that everybody in America would have made up their minds about whether or not to support the Big Mac. You would think after X number of years, and Y number of Big Macs, that people could finally make up their minds about the Big Mac. You're either for the Big Mac or against the Big Mac, right? And yet McDonalds spends enormous sums of money trying to convince all of us to give the Big Mac just one more chance. People make entertainment decisions day by day. And it's not just yes or no, but also more or less.
I think that number is actually low in a sense. To the men at bigsoccer: Think of how many times you've watched a soccer match with a woman. Hundreds and hundreds, right? Now think of how many times she would have watched it if you weren't there. A few times? Never? If we're thinking about who is making the decision to watch or attenend games, the figure is probably well over 90%, like most other sports. I hope I'm not offending any women here. There are plenty of great female sports fans, but they are in the distinct minority.
I made my mind up a long time ago. I hate Big Macs. The last time I had one, I was drunk in college in 1988. I think. Anyhow, you could send Michael Jordan and the Hamburglar over to my house with a 6 pack of Newcastle and a Big Mac and I still wouldn't eat it. Crap is crap. I have said this before, but I will never understand this phenomenon. Someone with the knowledge and the appreciation for the game won't watch it. For me, it was actually participating in an adult league that helped fuel my interest. But he is not alone, there are several folks on my team who don't care a wit about pro soccer. Over the years I have broken some of them down. 2 years ago I was the only one on my team with the MLS shootout package. Now 3 of us have it and there a 2 Burn season ticket holders. I have been to Burn games with 7 or 8 different guys on my team. It takes time and effort. Especially time. 7 years is not that long. Drew Bledsoe has been a pro quarterback for longer.
i think the easiest way to bring new guys into the fray is to let them know that alcohol plays a crucial part... you tailgate, go inside the stadium piss drunk, work off the alcohol by going crazy with the local support faction, then go outside and have another beer or two before heading home works pretty damn well for me in encouraging guys that HATE soccer, not to mention soccer fans that have never been mls fans or are euro-posers
Well, I'm a new soccer fan. I got into soccer by supporting Korea in the World Cup. I thought it'd be a once in a 4 year thing for me to start following soccer but it stuck. It's funny cuz I've tried before to follow but found it boring. Now I have a respect for the game. And while I might now be a fullgrown soccer fan, it's slowly happening. I figured since I can't watch the Korea NT play for another 4 years, I got the Metrostars right across the Hudson. I'm slowly learning about the league and BigSoccer has definitely helped a lot. I've even been watching EPL and other international teams through FOX Sports World. I'm still a baseball and hockey fan before anything else, but hey, I'm learning.
That's great. It proves that you don't have to have "disdain" for other sports to like soccer. Preach the news to your friends and go to as many games as you can. You'll be surprised how much it will start to matter to you. James
You know what is interesting about your thoughts...soccer playing youths outnumber other sports. If they remain MLS fans...we would have big numbers. Ironically, we are horrible at keeping them playing (club, $$$$$, idiot armchair parents, burnout) and the ones that stick with it through high school aren't interested in going to games. I read somewhere that the retention rate in football and baseball is higher even if we outnumber them early on. It's money in America. It's too damn expensive past the rec level. I know teens who loved MLS when they were young and it was new, and won't even watch it on TV...they tune into European soccer if the Simpsons isn't on.
Yeah, it's funny too cuz I find myself defending soccer when my friends start saying how stupid it is. I have a newfound respect for the game. Anyway, I'm tryin to go to a game. But I can't stand driving out to the Meadowlands. Traffic galore.
(bows) No, they're trying to convince people who might choose another burger entirely that they would like a Big Mac, while they ignore people for whom Big Macs aren't even an option. Very little of McDonald's spending on ads for Big Macs is targeted at vegetarians, for example. Likewise, the American soccer-spectator community is divided into people who would consider watching MLS and those who would not. A huge portion of those who would not are rejecting MLS by virtue of its being an American soccer league and thus by its very nature an inferior product, despite any evidence to the contrary. Not only are these people comfortable with their present viewing habits, they, in many cases, derive tremendous satisfaction from having rejected something, you know, vulgar and American. With tremendous effort and time and expenditure, you might be able to convince some of this relatively small population of people to try MLS, and some small percentage of that group may be convinced that the league's not so bad. But the opportunity costs are huge, and on the whole, MLS is better off writing that group off altogether in favor of trying to reach the much larger group of more easily convinced people.