Has anybody noticed a major difference in quality of games when comparing the cold weather games early and late in the MLS season with the summer games? Even after tonight's contest, played in what FSW called high thirties, I just don't see such a huge difference that Wynalda always talks about. He wants MLS to match up with the usual Fall/Winter soccer tables played around most of the world and I can respect his belief. But he keeps harping on how the quality would be so much better (I believe he actually compared summer soccer to snails chasing something). I don't think making that change would help the league at all. You'd be going head to head with NFL, College sports, NBA, and NHL. IF we had 10 SSS, you'd get past the scheduling conflicts, but without those stadiums, we would have to toss Soccer Saturday and decent ESPN2 coverage out the window. Attendance would definitely suffer around the league. It MIGHT work if we played a split schedule (say Aug-mid Nov, then late Feb to early May), but I can't see too many coming to Soldier Field or Gillette when there's eight inches of snow on the ground and temperatures hovering near zero. Like him or not, he does make some good points. But his support of following the international calendar seems odd to me. The only reasons given (much higher quality then summer soccer & that's how the rest of the world does it) do not stand up to scrutiny.
i can't believe the league website hired this guy to write for them. he constantly critisizes the league and what they do and how they do things. plus, he just doesn't seem to be a skilled writer. he just sort of writes what he's thinking, not actually thinking about what he's writing.
i think the difference is seen during the hottest days of the summer like when 2 people passed out at the meadowlands... when players in naperville and dallas burnt their feet it's more of a field turf issue (personally)... but it is something to think about but i also can't see us realling doing winter soccer in places like new england, chicago and meadowlands games get called in england and germany for frozen turfs... the turf would be frozen for quite some time in those areas
Gotta agree with him about the Rapids goalkeeper situation... Colorado Rapids: eliminated by Kansas City.
I'd wager fake money that his is the most popular column on MLSnet.com. It gets viewers in there, which is probably their goal.
I just wonder how he can call for MLS to follow the FIFA calendar and talk about how he'll be the popsicle with the microphone in EARLY NOVEMBER in Chicago in the same column. As for L.A. and the credibility of the playoffs, that's more because nobody likes L.A. (and they don't care). In other sports, say baseball, the team with the worst record of everyone in the playoffs winning is a story about the underdog, not about the inadequecies in the playoff format. Marlins, anyone? Later, COZ (who doesn't actually know if the Marlins had the worst record of the teams going into the MLB playoffs, but the point still holds)
Um, the MLB playoff team with the worst record is often also the team with the 8th best record out of 30 teams. Compare that to MLS playoff team with the worst record having the 8th best record out of 10 teams (LA was actually 9th, one step away from last place). - Paul
Which makes him all the more compelling to read, IMO. Especially when it comes to critiques as to what's happening in the league's matters on and off the field. I never miss a column of his, as do many others here, I'm sure. Eric Wynalda's not afraid to call a spade a spade, and he doesn't give a damn about what anyone thinks about his opinions. I think that's pretty ballsy, and we're all richer for it. Look at what he said about the Rapids' consequences for Hankinson playing musical 'keepers, and then about the Troy Dayak-Carlos Ruiz row... In regards to Troy Dayak's behavior this past weekend: unfortunately this is nothing new. Troy has always used certain forms of intimidation to get him what he believes is an advantage on the field. This time obviously he took things way too far. And to be honest, I'm embarrassed for him. I know you can say what you want when you're on the outside looking in, but never do you take things to the extreme which he did this week. If what happened on Saturday occurred in public, Troy would be facing serious charges and that's not the kind of behavior that soccer players have exemplified over the years. Waldo's played with and against Troy countless times over a number of years, so he has that perspective of knowing what Dayak's personality is like. And he's able to relay that to us, accordingly. I like Troy Dayak and what he's able to do on the field, fair dinkum-- but I think Eric's spot on in this instance. It won't cost Dayak a place on the field, but it might put that psychological nugget in Ruiz's head that he might be able to get away with a little more than he might otherwise.
I love the column as much as Bradley and Hard C. I just happen to disagree with winter soccer. Besides, I love to read and hear different opinions then my own, especially controversial ones. They tend to make me think more, and facilitate good debates. I like that he has strong opinions on things, and that he did fess up here to having a poor World Cup 1998 and having to deal with that on his own. MLS needs good criticism. Waldo is not doing the horrid soccer bashing. He's just saying what he thinks. Kudos to MLSnet for posting his words.
Switching to a fall-spring schedule would be absolute suicide. College football and the NFL would completely overshadow MLS in the fall, and the momentum would be lost by Super Bowl time. There would be zero ratings on TV, because it just wouldn't be there. And forget about weekday games; it just wouldn't work during school time. Northern European countries play a spring-fall schedule with no ill effects, and it should continue here as well. There's just no way to go head to head with football, and not be decimated. Wynalda may have been a good soccer player, but he lacks wisdom. The old ASL found out long ago that a fall-spring schedule wouldn't work for soccer in the US, and there's no need or reason to go back.
Damn it Dave, great minds do think alike. I wrote to him with exactly those sentiments. The ASL played forty years according to the international standard, complete with a league cup. Outside of a few clubs in New England, it existed in obscurity. In the 30's, it was on par with the NFL. Outside of New York and Washington, the NFL was mainly popular in Pennsylvania and the Midwest. At least four different clubs failed to catch on Boston before the Patriots, as many as six different Yankee football clubs played in that era, as well as a few Brooklyn Dodgers. What did the NFL do to sell itself and make it what it is today? Increase the value of a touchdown? Move the goal posts to the goal line? He says no one has ever tried to sell soccer as it's normally played. What, because the wasn't a Phil Anschutz with enough swag to keep the league afloat and promote the hell out of it? No marketing machine to sell the charming nuances of a scoreless draw? Ha. If in forty years the sport can't become nationally popular as it is, maybe it should make adjustments. Some people criticized the NPSL, and later the NASL, for the bonus points for goals. But that system had already been proposed in England. One English football writer said that it was appropriate that an American league should blaze that trail. Waldo says to a fan in England (who innocently asked if there was an international TV deal in the offing) that the league is stealing England's sport and Americanizing it. It's crap like that that gets him all of the angry emails. This sport has been played in America as long as any other, with the possible exception of baseball. If Harvard hadn't played an exhibition against McGill in 1874, it might be our national passion. But Wynalda wants to treat this game like it's the gospel in a land of heathens. A revelation.
Going up against a full season of baseball, with just a small amount of basketball, football, and hockey, is WAY better than going up against full seasons of basketball, football, AND hockey, and only a small amount of baseball. It's okay to go by the FIFA calendar in Europe and South America, where soccer is the absolute dominant sport, but that sh!t won't fly here in the states..it's virtually suicide.
They should eliminate every part of his column except for his angry responses to people asking about that debacle in France.