Ah, okay, now it's become clearer.

 

All sports are about heritage. USA has no soccer heritage hence no soccer love. But the other 95% of the world does. We just tied Italy (1:1), btw.

 

Goddamn it, now we have to hear them talk about another 'war' with Ghana now.

 

Ha. I barely missed the game today against Italy. Own goal? That sucks.

 

hah.. not really since it was the equalizer for the US

the 2nd goal that got called back was garbage

 

it has to start somewhere


and where do you think US soccer would be if there was not MLB, NFL or NBA and only MLS... think how deep our talent pool would be ..lol

always wondered how many good strikers the US would have if all the speed was not in the NFL

 

Well what I meant was that it sucks for Italy.

 

You would think 2 or 3 would have slipped thorugh the clutches of the NBA and NFL by now.

 

Starting now I think so. With the MLS running and being a good league to actually have professional soccer players in the US is a great motivator. With the MLS being around for about 10 years now I think, the soccer talent pool is getting good in the states. This MNT is the best squad we have ever put together, and half of them are playing in the MLS.

Before you would have to go outside the US if you wanted to make a living playing the sport. Level that against being able to play in the NFL, MLB, or NBA and I think athletes knew what they had to do to make money playing a game.

With MLS being a professional league in the US, kids can keep playing soccer in the US and have an aspiration besides playing on the MNT and hoping they can get picked up in an overseas team.

 

The grandstands are half empty in MLS games and the few people that attend are immigrants. If they sold 60-80k tickets per game (in other words, if 60-80k people were willing to watch MLS players) they would be getting paid on par with other major sports here. I was in Barcelona in 2003 and wanted to watch a regular Spanish Primera league game but I had a hard time getting the tickets. It was comparable to getting the Bulls tickets during Jordan's era. So its the heritage. If people are not interested in the game, the fan base is small. The TV ratings are low. The attendance is low... But, I agree with you, things are getting better slowly. The thing is, small countries like Spain, Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro, Lithuania, Greece etc. excell in many sports, not just soccer so the correlation between sport's success and the size of a talent pool is low.

 

Not true. MLB, NFL, NBA, and NHL salaries are as high as they are because of their TV rights deals. The NFL is making billions from television, and that's almost all of the money used for salaries. Ticket and stadium revenues are where team operational expenses come from for the most part.

 

If there were 60k people in the stands, there would be millions watching on TV. I agree that TV deals and advertising is what brings the most money.

 

what the hell other sport are thoes countrys pumping out super stars at ?

Cricket does not count

 

Spain: top 5 in the world in soccer, basketball, handball, waterpolo.
Croatia: best handball team in the world currently, pretty good soccer team, excellent tennis team (Davis cup winners), top 5 in waterpolo.
Serbia and Montenegro: won the last 3 of 4 world championships in basketball, best waterpolo team in the world, top 3 I think in volleyball.
Lithuania: 2003 euro champs in basketball - overall top 3 team in the world currently.
Greece: 2005 euro champs in basketball, 2004 soccer champs.

 

Damn, I wish I could watch the end of the Us match this morning. The prize for winning is just a ticket to get *****slapped by Brazil, but still...