Why the popularity of soccer hasn't been moving so fast ?

It's hard to succeed in a country that already has a strong sport culture, don't forget that you have hockey, basketball, football and baseball

Soccer mostly meets success where it feared no rival...

But I noticed that soccer always struggles in countries that already own one big sport, in Canada the biggest sport is Hockey, in India the biggest sport is Cricket, in Australia the biggest sport is Aussie football or (rugby)

In all those countries, soccer struggles very hard just like in USA...

 

if you take a look at all of the major sports in the US, none of them came from nothing and exploded. Everyone from baseball to football to basketball took time to emerge as a major player. It also takes TV coverage for the sport, which ius taking time. It takes players who have played the gameprofessionally and watched the game having children who will grow up doing the same. It takes time. . Yes it has been 10 years but look at the TV coverage for MLS/Premier/World Cup has changed dramatically. The soccer specific stadium is a huge plus for many of our MLS teams and our national team is getting better all the time. It you build it, they will come.....eventually

 

soccer is like the 2nd most played sport in the USA.I would disagree with your original premise.You could ask why it is not more popular on TV. It is just not a traditional sport here, but it has grown TREMENDOUSLY. 20 years ago you could basically never see a game on TV.

 

One word alone ignorance! just got done talking to a co-worker about the game and his debate was shot down in two seconds and all he could come up with is he doesn't know anything about the game.

 

soccer is almost the first of second played sport everywhere, i think he probably meant why this sport isn't more popular on tv

 

as a new fan to soccer(about one year) it took a friend from england to show me the details of the game and the skill involved for me to appreciate it before I liked it. He explained it as basketball with your feet. Until then I just viewed it as a bunch of people running around the grass following some rules that I didnt understand. Now i'm hooked and catch every game I can. I just don't think people appreciate the excitement when someone isnt scoring and see 88 minutes of passing a ball and 2 minutes of excitement.

 

I think that there are a multitude of reasons for soccer not being as big as the "big 4" sports.

It takes quite a bit of knowledge of the game to appreciate. Someone who never played the game at a high level might not appreciate a clever run or a neat back-heel. Soccer did not grow as a youth sport until the mid-eighties and thus the bulk of the paying sports fans are too old. It is one thing to watch your kids play, but to truly appreciate the sport you had to play. I am 25 now and my generation is the one that was a part of the youth soccer explosion. I think it will take off, but it will take time.

I also don't think things are that far off. Hockey is not necessarily an "American" sport, yet it has been named a major sport here. I can see soccer/MLS taking over hockey within the next 10 years. The NHL doesn't even have a major national TV deal (yes, I know they are on OLN but does that count).

Be patient, I think with SSS and the "youth soccer explosion" coming of age, soccer will have its day in the US

 

Hockey hype is a pet peeve of mine.

Soccer is more popular in this country than hockey.

Its just that soccer fans are divided in this country.

Only the world cup can measure the soccer fans in this country.

take the mexico-us game for example if you add up both espn2 and univision viewers, 7.1 million people watched the game. The game was on at 2:30 AM ET and 11:30 PM PT!!!!!

Has a stanley cup final ever gotten those ratings ever. Even in prime time.

It just goes to show you that there is a northeastern bias in the sports media.

Can't wait for the ratings of the world cup this year.

Soccer is growing in this country. Right now it as in the olympicization phase.

 

aka the media

 

Soccer did not grow as a youth sport until the mid-eighties and thus the bulk of the paying sports fans are too old. It is one thing to watch your kids play, but to truly appreciate the sport you had to play. I am 25 now and my generation is the one that was a part of the youth soccer explosion. I think it will take off, but it will take time.

I also don't think things are that far off. Hockey is not necessarily an "American" sport, yet it has been named a major sport here. I can see soccer/MLS taking over hockey within the next 10 years. The NHL doesn't even have a major national TV deal (yes, I know they are on OLN but does that count).

Be patient, I think with SSS and the "youth soccer explosion" coming of age, soccer will have its day in the US[/QUOTE]

You dont need to play at a high level to enjoy this game or apreciate a clever run...
It's hard to turn someone to a soccer fan if he doesn't understand the MEANING of the game...

It takes months and many games to watch to understand the meaning of this game ...

And many americans don't want to make this little effort...

Also the fact that MLS is not big hurts a lot

When we analyse the evolution of soccer/MLS in the last 10 years, it's hard to believe that MLS could overcome Hockey in the next 10 years, no way. maybe 20 or 30 years...

 

Because soccer fans in the US are disparate.

Most American soccer fans don't like MLS for various reasons. Most MLS fans don't really like foreign soccer. Most EPL fans don't give a crap about Serie A, and neither of them give a crap about La Liga. A large number of foreign team fans don't watch the CL. You have the Hispanic fans who only care about the MFL.

Casual sports fans aren't going to watch either, because MLS has nobody they know and because foreign soccer has no Americans and are on small-time channels.

The World Cup is the only event where all American soccer fans of any ethnicity and casual sports fans with a passing interest in soccer get together to watch soccer. Unsurprisingly, ESPN2 gets big-time ratings.

That said, anybody who thinks soccer hasn't grown in this country is nuts. Ten years ago, you got maybe one EPL game a week, a few highlights shows, and I think ESPN2 carried the occaisonal Champions League game when they had nothing going on.

Nowadays, anybody with digital cable can watch more soccer than a good deal of Europeans get access to.

 

I agree that traditionally soccer has always had trouble competing with the four major sports but mostly because sports fans as well as sports editors never new much about the sport to promote it and never gave it much credit. Also, I think that both World Wars had something to do with hurting the sport of soccer in this country.
The immigrant mentality in the early 20's as well as in the 40's and 50's was to be American and not play or speak anything foreign. I know a lot of my Italian relatives were actually looked down upon in California anyway, if they spoke Italian. Playing soccer was also always considered a foreign sport and a tabu for American kids to play. That mentality is still prevalent today as I rarely see a bunch of American born kids getting together on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon to play a pick up soccer match. If you notice or ever watch those games you will always see maybe one or two Americans and the rest of the players are ethnics or foreign born.
If you look at the NASL and their promoting schemes you can see how desperate those owners were to get the league off the ground. Digital and satellite TV has helped a great deal in getting the sport of soccer on the map as did WC 94. The fact that USMNT has qualified for 5 consecutive WC's also has helped in gaining attention to the sport.
Honestly however, I do think that Europe/UEFA and FIFA realize that the only way to really gain or promote the sport of soccer around the world and make money for their flagship teams and/or tournaments alike, they must involve American sponsorship dollars as well as get the TV stations and/or Hollywood involved. I think for this reason Red Bull, Barcelona and Chelsea are getting serious about American soccer.

 

Soccer will be big despite the MLS not because of it.

MLS and J-league started the same time look at the number of teams in the J league compared to MLS.


If American sports are so great why even after decades doesn't every state have a team. There's not even enough teams in total so to think you have much choice in supporting a team because its your local team you bedly mistaken.

If MLS stays the same as the NFL you'll never fully understand sport. I'm hoping the A-league and the super y clubs start developing into Adult regional leagues and then eventually competing in every state for a state champion to play off for a place in the Concaf champions league.

MLS teams will merge to survive.


PS why do you think multiple team ownership is banned every else in the world? Coz it's anti competition - your sports are rigged to spread around to keep fools paying money to watch.

 

Its hard to compare the other sports in this country with soccer. Even in the smaller states and/or markets you have minor league baseball and big time college football. You have states like Alabama selling out constantly and they don't have an NFL team and the same can be said with Notre Dame in South Bend Indiana. Until the Colts moved there all they had was college football. College basketball is another sport that gains notoriety in all small towns and states in the USA. Soccer in that sense has a long way to go to catch up with those 3 sports. I also think that traditionally the media frowned upon soccer so it wouldn't take away from those other sports. When you hear some journalists speak of the sport its almost as if they are talking out of their hats and its on the grounds of racism.
I don't like or understand the multi owner or multi team concept either. I'm surprised the USSF/FIFA doesn't intervene. I guess they figure for now they are letting the MLS do what they want in order for the league to last and survive. Its actually a contradiction especially when you have owners favoring one of their team over the other and when it came to the REVS/Clash or AEG/Quakes it was at the expense of the Quakes and that wasn't right. Its funny how Tim Lewieke talked so highly of the franchise when it relocated to Houston but never had one word of praise while they were winning successfully in San Jose.

 

Why.....? Come on ...Do you thing the media have something to do with it....? The job of the media is to report everything in every sport Golf, Tennis, Baseball, NFL, but where in the hell is the soccer ? About 75 percent in Austin Tx is not aware that USA have a soccer team going to the world cup

 

Hogwash....If the USA national team play here in HOUSTON TX next week it will be a sold out but I can bet you those news won't be on CNN headline News or Midland sport news paper...

 

You are absolutely right my friend.The media in this country is run by a bunch of old fools who will do everything they can to make sure our sport does not succeed especially the sports media.Just look at SPORTS CENTER and ESPN.

 

If you read Mark Purdy of the San Jose Mercury News or listen to Ralph Barbieri on the radio in the bay area, you will absolutely hate soccer. To hear them write or speak about the sport will turn anyone off. All they care and know about is baseball and football. Maybe a little bit of basketball but that's it. Its funny because hockey is fairly new on the west coast and it has a sort of same concept as soccer has, and they seem to warm up to hockey but not soccer. I'm sure they are afraid that soccer will one day take away from "their" sports or at least the sports they know and write about.
I'm sure that the media had something to do with the lack of fan and/or ownership support for the San Jose Earthquakes. I believe if the media got behind the Earthquakes in San Jose as they do or did with the SJ Sharks, things would have been different!
I'm not saying that the media was totally to blame for the AEG moving the Quakes, but I'm sure they contributed to the lack of stadium support and/or ownership.

 

There are teams across the country, but without a system like England (or most of the rest of the world) with a chance to promote to higher leagues, there is no incentive for fans to follow the teams.

For example, in my area there is the West Michigan Soccer League, which has actually some good players and decent teams... but none of these teams have a chance to play in the MLS, no matter how good they get, so that makes it harder for the average fan to care about.

If USSF would set up a huge nationwide league like England has, with several divisions and levels, then it would grow to the level the sport is in England, because the fans wouldn't have to "glory hunt" and just randomly support one of the few cities that were chosen to play in the top league. They could support their own city/regional team(s) in persuit of reaching the highest league.

If one day a Michigan team makes it to the MLS then it will have complete local support. It won't be supported just because "it's the closest team we can possibly support, so we might as well" like it is now. Michigan fans have to chose between Chicago Fire (Chicago teams are a natural rival of Detroit BTW) or Columbus Crew (Columbus is 4 hours away from the Michigan-Ohio border) for their "local" team. Most people here say "******** that" and just support the Pistons (NBA) instead.

I'm not saying MLS should just plop down a franchise in Detroit for us to support (even though that will probably happen before the promotion/relegation system is used), but at the moment a large portion of the national fanbase doesn't have a local team to support in MLS (like us), so they jut don't follow it. If a team such as PASS Impacto (a name taken from the link posted above) somehow makes it to the MLS, then it will have a true fan base, and not one who is forced to support it.

 

I seriously don't think the promotion/relegation system will ever work in the USA. American born soccer fans not to mention the majority of sports fans in this country were never raised with such a system. The only people whom I believe would relate to that type of relegation or promotion system would be the ethnic or foreign fans.
I don't think it will ever work in the American Sports landscape. You have the 49ers going from 2-14 to winning a Super Bowl in just two years and the same can be said in the MLS for the Quakes & KC who went from worst to first in successive years. I think American fans like and respect having the same league and the same teams year in and year out. In Europe you will never see the top clubs relegated. I could just imagine what would happen if Juve, Milan and Inter or Liverpool and/or Manchester United for that matter, were ever relegated. I'm sure they would definitely abolish the relegation system if that were to happen. The top leagues around the world can not afford to lose top clubs, especially with today's sponsorship and tv money.
I'm not so sure about England but in Italy anyway, the teams who get relegated and promoted are usually the same teams who go up and down in 4-5 year span. For example you have Cagliari, Atalanta, Udinese and Bologna. These teams are always up and down. You rarely see a top club in Italy relegated. Maybe Napoli but they were always on the verge of relegation at least in the 70's & 80's with the exception of when Maradona was playing for them. Milan was relegated in the 80's because of game a fixing scandal but then came back for one year then went down but they got promoted in 84 and initiated their spectacular run of winning many "scudetti". Their record speaks for itself. Juventus and Inter have never been relegated and Roma being the capitol city won't allow their team to falter to the Serie B either.

 

Except this is economically impossible to install. Soccer has a hard enough time finding investors. Finding investors for everything would be useless.

Promotion/relegation is a dinosaur in the modern sporting world. It's an incredible economic stress on the teams involved - many clubs have gone bust in the UK trying to stay up. MLS is stable, but hardly prospering.

Maybe, MAYBE, you have a two-division system in 30 years time when there is enough money to go around, but the MLS would turn into ABA2000 if it tried to set up a huge system like that which exists in England.

And the idea of soccer being followed as much as it is in England is preposterous. Not going to happen folks. I could see soccer becoming one of the "big three" along with football and baseball, but the idea of soccer becoming the new national pastime? No way. Minor league baseball achieves something fairly close to this divided system, and the NFL is still more popular in large swathes of the country.

Oh, nice moment today. I walked into the SF Niketown, which is covered in Joga Bonito promotions, and was amused and heartened at the shock from European tourists that American shops actually sell football kit. The sport is growing in this country.

 

It doesn't matter if the fans grew up with promotion/relegation or not. At one point a generation grew up without the internet, does that mean it should have never been introduced because the people weren't used to it?

Promotion/Relegation is a system that allows for fans of all teams to remain excited about a season reguardless of whether their team is the best or worst in the league. In all American sports half of the teams are out of title contention by mid-season, and there is absolutely no reason to support them anymore because the season is essentially over. Some teams are never competative... for example the Detriot Tigers. The last time "we" (I say we because they are the team I follow, since they are the closest MLB team to my city) won anything was 1984, the year I was born. Since then, the team has only made the play-offs once: 1987... nearly 20 years ago. There is no reason to cheer for them at all, every year they are 20-30 games behind first place midway into the season with no hope of going to the play-offs. What is the point of having this team around? If they aren't going to be competative, then send them to a lower league that they can be competative in and let someone else who can actually challenge for the title come up and take their place. This can't happen without promotion/relegation.

Also, as in the case of the Tigers, a system with relegation would give the fans a reason to come out and support them. No one (from around here at least) wants to see the Tigers get "demoted" or whatever. So if they were in a "race to avoid relegation" with (whoever else sucks in baseball, I don't really follow it) then even if the Tigers are 58 games behind a play-off spot, there is still reason to go cheer them on, so that they at least don't get sent down and stay up for another year. Or if they finally do have a season like a few years ago where they had the most losses ever... then fine, send them down. And then we will actually get to see our team win some games an be competative... albeit against lower skilled teams. IMO that would be much better for me, and all other Tiger fans, than just watching season after season pass where we are nothing more than an extra couple of games on the schedule for the teams who are actually competing for something.

Same with the Lions. They haven't won anything since 1957... they've only been in the play-offs 6 times since I've been alive, the latest over half a dozen years ago... in 1999. Why are these teams so bad year after year? Because there is no consequence for failure in the USA leagues. If you lose, there is no harsh penalty like being kicked out of your league and replaced by a "better" team. Instead, you are rewarded by being able to select one of the best incoming players (as a top draft pick). In Italy, AS Roma doesn't take a season off and do terrible because they can't afford it, they will get demoted (no matter if Rome is the capital of Italy or not). That's why the big teams in Europe always win, because they know they can't slip up and take a season or two off and just "play" and take in money from the crowds. Teams in the USA can. That's why you have the Tampa Bay Buccaneers win a Super Bowl one year (2002) and then not even make the play-offs for the next two years (2003 and 2004). That could never happen to Manchester United, not because they are so great, but because if they do sell off their good players like the Buccs and just sit on the money to make a profit... they are going to lose and get relegated. And that will cost them a hell of a lot more trying to get back to the EPL than it will cost the Buccs to pay for their brand new first round draft pick.

I mean, we take these teams (the Tigers and Lions) for granted. Even though they suck, at least they are there, year in and year out. So maybe we will got to a game if we feel like it, but otherwise, who cares, they're still going to be there next year. Meanwhile the people in Nebraska/Oklahoma would kill to have an NFL team to support. But without a promotion/relegation system, they will never be able to get one.

This upcoming season in England some team called "Reading" finally promoted to the EPL. They've been a club since the 1800s (according to what I've read about them) and this is the first time they are in the EPL in over 135 years of exsistance. I guarentee their stadium is going to be sold out every game, and the fans are really going to appriciate competing in the EPL, it's going to be an amazing experience for those fans. Even if they do end up doing terribly and being sent back down. That's why the EPL is so popular, because you have fans of teams who are competing to win titles (Man United, Chelsea, etc) who are excited about the season, and then you have teams who are just happy to be there and are trying not to get relegated (Sunderland, Reading, etc [sorry I don't know many lower EPL teams]). Everyone is passionate about their teams. Meanwhile, in America you are missing the second half of that equation, for MLS and for every sport. You have the fans of the teams who are doing good who are excited, but then you have all the other teams who just take it for granted that they are even in the same league as these other teams. And that takes away from the passion of the fans... be in MLB, NFL, or even MLS.

I noticed that all of the countries you listed don't have a promotion/relegation league either, except India who is only starting to put one into place. According to wikipedia they added a second division in 1998 and they promote/relegate 2 teams each year between the two, but it is still a relatively closed system compared to true promotion/relegation systems in the rest of the world where leagues go sometimes 10 divisions deep. In India's system, there are only 24 teams... 10 in the top league and 12 in the lower league.

 

I've even read in some newspapers while I was in Europe that there are some European countries who were ready to abolish that system and possibly only promote and relegate maybe only 1 or 2 teams in order to stabilize their own national league.
I'll tell you this, historically there have been clubs like Palermo who never made it to the Serie A until now and who actually wanted to stay in the lower divisions. I'm not sure why but their reasoning was always if they were promoted they would lose money. I know that doesn't make sense but that is what the Sicilians always said.
The only reason Palermo was promoted was because owner Maurizio Zamparini , who owns a chain of grocery stores, wanted to get his stores into the Sicily region and therefore, bought the club bought Luca Toni as well as other top players and they were promoted. As soon as his money goes however, Palermo could possibly get relegated.
Regardless of how much we talk about the pros and cons or ifs, ands or buts, the first and second divisions or the promotion/relegation system, I doubt it ever happen in America! No matter how much you strongly believe in it, it just won't happen! I'll believe it when I see it!