Sound Off: Is Football (Finally) on the Rise in America?

[fugazi]

Quote: Originally Posted by NYwRiter94

What I'm complaining about is that soccer fans refuse to believe that soccer is anything but perfect in its current form and that any changes to a sport that, honestly, is globally popular only because of its low cost and simplicity to play, will somehow destroy it.

Well, fwiw, I never said it was perfect, and I don't know anyone that has.

And I think you are really understating the reasons for it's appeal.


The game has evolved organically, just as baseball and football and basketball have. In fact, it is the IDIOSYNCRASIES of each game/sport that make it special.

The Draw, The Substitution, The Time Wasting...these are all things that require a critical approach and add strategy and depth to the game.

It's not about perfection, it's about the game having a spirit of it's own, just as do the others.

[fugazi]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_L...cer_attendance

MLS attendance vs. other US major sports

League	Sport	# Teams	Season	Average attendance	Average vs. prior season	Total Attendance	Source
National Football League	American football	32	2011	64,698	–280	17,124,389	[2]
Major League Baseball	Baseball	30	2012	30,895	+533	74,859,268	[3]
Major League Soccer	Soccer	19	2012	18,807	+935	6,074,729	[4]
National Hockey League	Ice hockey	30	2011-12	17,455	+323	21,470,155
National Basketball Association	Basketball	30	2013-14	17,407	+59	21,411,543	[5]

MLS attendance vs. other soccer leagues worldwide

League	Country	Season	Teams	Games	Total attendance	Average attendance	Source(s)
Bundesliga	Germany	2011–12	18	306	13,811,075	45,179	[6]
Premier League	England	2012–13	20	380	13,643,273 [b]	35,903	[7]
La Liga	Spain	2012–13	20	380	11,504,567	29,430	[8]
Liga MX	Mexico	2011–12	18	334	8,495,000	25,434	[9]
Serie A	Italy	2011–12	20	380	8,914,420	23,459	[10]
Eredivisie	Netherlands	2011–12	18	306	5,978,689	19,538	[11]
Ligue 1	France	2012–13	20	380	7,299,737	19,261	[12]
Major League Soccer	USA / Canada	2012	19	323	6,074,729	18,807	[13]
Chinese Super League	China	2012	16	240	4,497,578	18,740	[14] 1
Primera División Argentina	Argentina	2011–12	20	380	6,902,798	18,165	[15][16]
Football League Championship	England	2012–13	24	552	9,791,690	17,331	[17]
Bundesliga 2	Germany	2012–13	18	306	5,283,396	17,240	[6]
J. League 1	Japan	2013	18	306	5,271,047	17,226	[18]
Campeonato Brasileiro Série A	Brazil	2012	20	380	4,941,520	13,004	[19]

[yankeesgiants]

Quote: Originally Posted by fugazi

Exactly...the only people who think it isn't growing or isn't popular or isn't viable are people who don't pay any attention to soccer in the first place, so how would they know?

Demos of new participants tell the story. The rise in American soccer participation has been in the suburban yuppie/hipster demo. Basically the offspring of the preppies that supported the NASL in the 70's & 80's and lacrosse in the 90's. Why is this important? Because this demo doesn't need sports for upward mobility. That is huge problem because growth & participation aren't the same thing.

[NYwRiter94]

Quote: Originally Posted by fugazi

The Draw, The Substitution, The Time Wasting...these are all things that require a critical approach and add strategy and depth to the game. It's not about perfection, it's about the game having a spirit of it's own, just as do the others.

Playing not to win and wasting time add strategy and depth?

And I never said it was about perfection. I also never complained about the passion and fervor with which soccer fans support their teams. I was complaining about the on-field product in professional leagues and environments. I think the game of soccer is a great game which is (relatively) held back by its stubborn leaders at the professional and international level.

Quote: Originally Posted by fugazi

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_L...cer_attendance MLS attendance vs. other US major sports League Sport # Teams Season Average attendance Average vs. prior season Total Attendance Source National Football League American football 32 2011 64,698 –280 17,124,389 [2] Major League Baseball Baseball 30 2012 30,895 +533 74,859,268 [3] Major League Soccer Soccer 19 2012 18,807 +935 6,074,729 [4] National Hockey League Ice hockey 30 2011-12 17,455 +323 21,470,155 National Basketball Association Basketball 30 2013-14 17,407 +59 21,411,543 [5] MLS attendance vs. other soccer leagues worldwide League Country Season Teams Games Total attendance Average attendance Source(s) Bundesliga Germany 2011–12 18 306 13,811,075 45,179 [6] Premier League England 2012–13 20 380 13,643,273 [b] 35,903 [7] La Liga Spain 2012–13 20 380 11,504,567 29,430 [8] Liga MX Mexico 2011–12 18 334 8,495,000 25,434 [9] Serie A Italy 2011–12 20 380 8,914,420 23,459 [10] Eredivisie Netherlands 2011–12 18 306 5,978,689 19,538 [11] Ligue 1 France 2012–13 20 380 7,299,737 19,261 [12] Major League Soccer USA / Canada 2012 19 323 6,074,729 18,807 [13] Chinese Super League China 2012 16 240 4,497,578 18,740 [14] 1 Primera División Argentina Argentina 2011–12 20 380 6,902,798 18,165 [15][16] Football League Championship England 2012–13 24 552 9,791,690 17,331 [17] Bundesliga 2 Germany 2012–13 18 306 5,283,396 17,240 [6] J. League 1 Japan 2013 18 306 5,271,047 17,226 [18] Campeonato Brasileiro Série A Brazil 2012 20 380 4,941,520 13,004 [19]

Not really sure what this has to do with anything. MLS has much cheaper ticket prices (about half price) than the NHL and NBA, and would have a lower average attendance than the NHL and NBA if you take out the outlier Seattle Sounders FC, who play in the Seahawks stadium and have double the attendance of any other team. The Chicago Blackhawks lead average attendance for both the NHL and NBA with 117.3% attendance and 22,623 average fans, which is smaller than the capacity for eight (AKA almost half) MLS stadiums.

As for the comparison with other leagues, the USA clearly matches favorably with the other countries on that list in regard to the total population with disposable income to spend on luxuries such as tickets to professional soccer matches. The only notable achievements are surpassing Argentina and Brazil, although they really aren't that impressive when you consider the three countries' ranking in the above demographic.

Throw out your misleading statistics, but we're not going to fall for them.

[cubsfan203]

Quote: Originally Posted by NYwRiter94

Not really sure what this has to do with anything. MLS has much cheaper ticket prices (about half price) than the NHL and NBA, and would have a lower average attendance than the NHL and NBA if you take out the outlier Seattle Sounders FC, who play in the Seahawks stadium and have double the attendance of any other team. The Chicago Blackhawks lead average attendance for both the NHL and NBA with 117.3% attendance and 22,623 average fans, which is smaller than the capacity for eight (AKA almost half) MLS stadiums. As for the comparison with other leagues, the USA clearly matches favorably with the other countries on that list in regard to the total population with disposable income to spend on luxuries such as tickets to professional soccer matches. The only notable achievements are surpassing Argentina and Brazil, although they really aren't that impressive when you consider the three countries' ranking in the above demographic. Throw out your misleading statistics, but we're not going to fall for them.

The numbers are relevant to this conversation. Over the past 5-10 years the MLS attendance numbers have been on the rise. Over the same time period both the NHL and NBA have been flat at best, but really have gone down slightly.

A 20% increase in attendance since 2004 isn't something to scoff at.

[fugazi]

Quote: Originally Posted by NYwRiter94

Not really sure what this has to do with anything. Throw out your misleading statistics, but we're not going to fall for them.

um....this thread posed a question.

and in this thread, a number of people offered their opinion that soccer would never be this or that or take over these 4 yadda yadda etc.

while i don't particularly care, bc the issue isn't whether the MLS will become bigger than MLB or NFL or anything...and bc I will spend most of my soccer time watching other leagues...

I can't for the life of me figure out how anyone could make such a ridiculous statement regarding a table that showed MLS had higher per-game average attendance than NBA and NHL.

Even with the caveats you mentioned, which are far from damning, the fact remains. I didn't say it suggested some kind of great change in the landscape, just posted the fact.

I don't know what is misleading about it.

The top NBA teams draw more than twice the lower ones per game...

regardless, I don't see how anyone that has paid any attention to the sports landscape in the US since the early 90s can't discern the considerable, consistent, and obvious rise in the popularity of soccer in the US.

I would say you are trolling, except you seem to take your argument way too seriously.


And re: the other post about demographics...I don't think it's altogether true...and to whatever degree it is, it will change. The local HS team here is mostly Hispanic...i've seen places where they have strong African or Asian immigrant communities with the same thing...Soccer is not confined in America to the children of NASL supporters or yuppies...and support for the MLS stands to gain as these gruops integrate.

[KG]

Quote: Originally Posted by eyeamg0dly

I don't see that ever happening. Our football is more than just a cult like following, it is part of our culture like soccer is to most of the world. The NFL is designed not to tank because of how it shares its profits among all the teams. the only way the NFL can go on the decline is if America itself stops existing.

It will be interesting to see what happens to the NFL as safety issues continue to arise in awareness. I feel as though more parents will be willing to let their kids play football when they're young.

Quote: Originally Posted by NYwRiter94

That's to encourage parity in leagues that are dependent upon television revenues. If the Pittsburgh Penguins didn't get three straight top two picks, the team would have moved, as there are other teams in Pittsburgh (the Steelers, Pirates) that people can watch. In the rest of the world, that's not an option. You have your soccer team and that's it. Conversely, if a crappy EPL team in a bad city drafted the next superstar, he'd just go play in Germany or Italy. If Aaron Ekblad or Sam Bennett (top NHL draft prospects) gets drafted first overall by Florida, they're not taking their talents to Russia for less money and a lower quality of life. American sports leagues feature all of the premier players in a given sport, unlike soccer where there are several leagues who compete for players. As for the draw thing, I'm really glad to see people talking about the "win at all costs" perspective of the US. Sure, I'm just an ignorant biased American, but I truly believe that we do sports better than anywhere else in the world. Not because of the specific sports we play, but because with all of these different sports we play, we have had more opportunities to figure out what does and doesn't work in sports. There are some rules in soccer that make no sense -- why are there only three subs allowed in the World Cup with no re-entry? It doesn't make you "tough" to play a full 90 minutes, particularly because it just leads to players taking plays off and playing at less than 100%. Sure, there are breaks every 10 seconds in American football, but you also don't see Calvin Johnson taking a break to stretch out his hamstring on the line of scrimmage while the Detroit Lions are snapping the ball. The diving is also absurd. My friend told me that it's not tolerated in the MLS, so I'll take his word for it, but I don't understand how people are willing to watch the mockery of injuries that these players put on. Finally, the willingness to tie a game and the lack of drive to win shows itself in the way the players and teams play. I watched a player on Australia sit on an open opportunity to hit one of his players in stride entering the box, essentially giving him a perfect chance at a shot on goal. Soccer players seem content on making these very low-percentage plays such as crossing the ball to one forward in a sea of defenders, while an attempt at a much more creative play isn't even more inherently risky. The pageantry of the World Cup is great and I love supporting my team. But the on field product is worse than my high school team's. To be fair, my school is a college player factory and a perennial powerhouse, but they played a very "Americanized" version of the sport which, honestly, is way more entertaining to watch and seems much more successful. Because soccer is far and away the only globally important sport in the rest of the world, people are too afraid to change rules or traditions, which then prevents the sport from improving.

Rules are being changed all the time just like any other major sport. Goal-line technology was being called-upon for years and it was implemented this year. The diving in soccer is bad but every sport over-exaggerates contact. Hell, after almost every incomplete pass now in the NFL WR's are calling for a flag. I don't blame the players, I blame the respective leagues for not punishing that kind of behavior. Players are going to do whatever they can to create advantageous situations. In regards to low % plays, it's no different than in hoops when someone takes a deep mid-range jumper knowing they could step back a foot and take a 3. Low IQ players do low IQ things, that isn't sport dependent. I would love to see what this "Americanized" version of soccer is that your team plays.

Quote: Originally Posted by NYwRiter94

That was part of the bigger argument I was making in the entire paragraph. There is no relegation in American sports leagues (something that is pretty cool, but probably wouldn't work in the US because of the aforementioned singularity of leagues and concentration of talent). I won't pretend to know the individual instances of each European city, but I would be willing to guess there's less inter-sport competition than in US cities (most of the major ones, at least). That's not very often and only in the NFL, where injuries are so prevalent. In other sports you don't see that happen (maybe the NBA, but I'll get to that in a second). I personally hate basketball (college or professional, I'll watch my own school but that's about it). However, players who flop even once in a major game are attacked and criticized. It just seems like there's no accountability for it in soccer. American sports also realize that in a country with so many popular professional sports, fans are not going to watch or attend your product if there is an inconclusive result. While the overall outcome of a season is important, overtime in sports is something that usually raises the intensity and excitement of the given sport to another level. Yeah, I understand how that was interpreted, but I meant it from the standpoint of being a more fun sport to watch. I'm not implying that the players are better, because they clearly aren't, but the level I watched was high enough that the players were actually capable of completing passes and making plays, and I just thought the team game was more exciting to watch. To be fair, I also saw the game from a much better and closer angle than I have the few times I have seen professional soccer. No, but I played years of soccer in my life, have very close friends who have played their entire lives and still play at the Division 1 college level, and also have experience playing entire hockey games. In the NHL, an elite defender will max out at 30 minutes of ice time per game, half of the 60 minutes of gameplay. My senior year of high school, my partner and I would play 40+ minutes of an entire 45 minute game. It completely changes the way you play the game, as you intentionally sit back on certain plays including loose pucks and play a much more conservative style so you don't use up all of your energy. The team isn't playing a man down, though. I saw van Persie stretching out his hamstring on the 18 in the game against Australia while the ball was on that half of the field. It just seems mind-boggling to me that you could have players ON THE FIELD who are occupied with something other than the game that's going on. I don't think it should be like American football -- they are pretty obviously two extremely different sports. In my post, I mentioned ice hockey, American football AND high school soccer. The reason I brought up three different sports? Because that's what American sports are all about. People find things in different sports and apply them to their own and it makes the game better. Video replay, which originated in the NFL, is now being used in the NHL and MLB (maybe the NBA too? I have no idea) and it makes those games much better. The NHL introduced the playoff system which is now present in every American sport and some foreign competitions including the World Cup. You complain that American fans want soccer to be more like American football. What I'm complaining about is that soccer fans refuse to believe that soccer is anything but perfect in its current form and that any changes to a sport that, honestly, is globally popular only because of its low cost and simplicity to play, will somehow destroy it.

If you played soccer for years how do you not understand the concept of a player taking a mini break to stretch, tie their shoe, adjust their equipment, etc? You must have had FIFA video game-like stamina where you could just sprint for the entire match. The reason they haven't globally introduced video-replay is because it's hard to fiscally accomplish. Sure, the EPL would be able to do it but smaller leagues around Europe/South American would struggle to be able to do it on a consistent basis. That's why goal-line technology wasn't introduced 4 years ago after the uproar that would have seen Lampard's shot vs Germany in the '10 WC be called a goal. It will eventually happen but sometimes these things take time. Also, some soccer leagues have a playoff system and they also have League Cups which are a mini/major tournament during the season that's apart from the actual Regular Season.

Quote: Originally Posted by NYwRiter94

Playing not to win and wasting time add strategy and depth?

And I never said it was about perfection. I also never complained about the passion and fervor with which soccer fans support their teams. I was complaining about the on-field product in professional leagues and environments. I think the game of soccer is a great game which is (relatively) held back by its stubborn leaders at the professional and international level.
NFL teams and NBA teams don't time waste? NFL teams run to milk the clock, NBA/College Hoops team hold the ball to run the shot clock down. It's all strategy and yes it does add depth to a game/season. There are very few more gut-wrenching experiences in sports to me than your soccer team holding a lead while the other team is going all-out for the win and just throwing waves forward.
You seem to be a pretty intelligent person but a lot of your arguments seem to lack a deeper understanding about the sport and its striking similarities to other sports.

[TimLawNYC]

Quote: Originally Posted by fugazi

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_L...cer_attendance MLS attendance vs. other US major sports League Sport # Teams Season Average attendance Average vs. prior season Total Attendance Source National Football League American football 32 2011 64,698 –280 17,124,389 [2] Major League Baseball Baseball 30 2012 30,895 +533 74,859,268 [3] Major League Soccer Soccer 19 2012 18,807 +935 6,074,729 [4] National Hockey League Ice hockey 30 2011-12 17,455 +323 21,470,155 National Basketball Association Basketball 30 2013-14 17,407 +59 21,411,543 [5] MLS attendance vs. other soccer leagues worldwide League Country Season Teams Games Total attendance Average attendance Source(s) Bundesliga Germany 2011–12 18 306 13,811,075 45,179 [6] Premier League England 2012–13 20 380 13,643,273 [b] 35,903 [7] La Liga Spain 2012–13 20 380 11,504,567 29,430 [8] Liga MX Mexico 2011–12 18 334 8,495,000 25,434 [9] Serie A Italy 2011–12 20 380 8,914,420 23,459 [10] Eredivisie Netherlands 2011–12 18 306 5,978,689 19,538 [11] Ligue 1 France 2012–13 20 380 7,299,737 19,261 [12] Major League Soccer USA / Canada 2012 19 323 6,074,729 18,807 [13] Chinese Super League China 2012 16 240 4,497,578 18,740 [14] 1 Primera División Argentina Argentina 2011–12 20 380 6,902,798 18,165 [15][16] Football League Championship England 2012–13 24 552 9,791,690 17,331 [17] Bundesliga 2 Germany 2012–13 18 306 5,283,396 17,240 [6] J. League 1 Japan 2013 18 306 5,271,047 17,226 [18] Campeonato Brasileiro Série A Brazil 2012 20 380 4,941,520 13,004 [19]

These attendance numbers don't show what you think they show. Average attendance isn't a reliable indicator because that can vary so much based on arena/stadium size (i.e., NBA arenas generally hold 17,000-20,000 fans, while football stadiums can hold around 70,000), relative ticket prices, and number of games per season.

To really evaluate a sport's popularity you need to look at TOTAL attendance--and by that measure, soccer's tiny 6,000,000 number is a drop in the bucket compared to the major sports in the USA. By contrast, over 41,000,000 attended MINOR LEAGUE baseball games in 2013 (see http://www.milb.com/news/article.jspymd=20130917&content_id=60843450&fext=.jsp&vkey=pr_milb&sid=milb). I realize that there are many more minor league baseball clubs in the U.S. than there are MLS teams, but it's difficult for you to make a case that soccer is somehow super popular here when nearly SEVEN TIMES more people annually attend minor league baseball.

Sure, soccer is "growing" in popularity here, because it has a relatively new league and it really has nowhere to go but up. But even the attendance numbers you cite show only a 935 person increase in attendance per game year to year, which I wouldn't exactly call explosive growth.

Bottom line, everybody always gets excited about the World Cup (because it is a legitimately great sporting event), but as soon as it's over (or if the U.S. doesn't advance out of the group stage), everybody will forget about it like they always do and soccer will go back to its rightful place in the U.S. as a third-tier sport.

Nobody cares about competitive bobsledding except during the Winter Olympics, either.