Michael's Conspiracy Theory

[rslfutbolfan]

Last weekend my friend Michael from San Jose was in town and came with me to the game. Michael was born in Iran but moved to California when he was quite young. He grew up playing soccer and continued playing in College. Michael is a thinker. He is always thinking and coming up with interesting ideas. While we were sitting at the tailgate we started talking about our problems with the stadium. Michael came up with an interesting thought. The popular sports (mainly baseball and football) in this country are afraid of soccer taking over their precious hold on the American peoples interest and pocketbooks. To them, soccer could literally threaten everything they have gained over the last 50 years (or more). Soccer could even threaten everything we consider truely american (we are a little egocentric-after all soccer is not an "american" sport). As the number of children playing soccer in this country is raising quickly, I have to assume the number of children playing baseball and football is decreasing. What will happen in 10 years when these children are having children of their own? What will happen to all of Larry Miller's teams? What will happen with all of those NFL, NBA, and MLB stadiums paid for with our tax money??? The last thing these sports want is more competition. So they have waged war on MLS soccer and locally on our very own Real Salt Lake and our quest for a stadium.

Discuss......

[Old Ska]

Originally Posted by rslfutbolfan

Last weekend my friend Michael from San Jose was in town and came with me to the game. Michael was born in Iran but moved to California when he was quite young. He grew up playing soccer and continued playing in College. Michael is a thinker. He is always thinking and coming up with interesting ideas. While we were sitting at the tailgate we started talking about our problems with the stadium. Michael came up with an interesting thought. The popular sports (mainly baseball and football) in this country are afraid of soccer taking over their precious hold on the American peoples interest and pocketbooks. To them, soccer could literally threaten everything they have gained over the last 50 years (or more). Soccer could even threaten everything we consider truely american (we are a little egocentric-after all soccer is not an "american" sport). As the number of children playing soccer in this country is raising quickly, I have to assume the number of children playing baseball and football is decreasing. What will happen in 10 years when these children are having children of their own? What will happen to all of Larry Miller's teams? What will happen with all of those NFL, NBA, and MLB stadiums paid for with our tax money??? The last thing these sports want is more competition. So they have waged war on MLS soccer and locally on our very own Real Salt Lake and our quest for a stadium.

Discuss......

More young American kids play soccer than any other sport. Or should I say "soccer", they seldom get into any significant training in tactics, technique, etc. By the time middle school comes around fewer and fewer kids play soccer and baseball, basketball and football take over. I think this is due to the fact that they never get a deep appreciation for the subtle nuances of the game or the larger tactical and skill sets required to truely play well. It has been just like this since I was born in 1970, and in the region of the country where I live it has changed very little (if anything kids are abandoning soccer at a slightly younger age now) but I can't speak to this in Utah. What we desperately need throughout the country are trained coaches, trained refs, and independant youth leagues to to take kids interested in soccer who don't make the high school teams, or travelinging regional teams. (Some cities do this extremely well.)

As far as the "big sports" worried about soccer...I don't see it. Face it, in terms of attendance just about every NASCAR event draws more spectators than any other sport in the US...easily 100,000 in markets that are considered small. The largest soccer attendance ever was 199,854 for the Brazil v. Uruguay World Cup final, the Brickyard 400 and Indy see twice that every year. I don't see the NFL or NBA trying to squash NASCAR or Indy. I think what we see is just that soccer doesn't appeal to the majority of Americans, and probably for reasons built into the game itself. It isn't less popular than other sports in the US because anyone is keeping it down, it is less popular* because I think we as a country like short bursts of action intersperced with commercial breaks. The best we can do is educate our friends about what makes watching soccer cool to us.

And I would even say that the continued marketing of American soccer towards suburbanites is not going to help soccer gain popularity in this country. I say market it to young, underpriviledged urban kids and then you will really see it take off. However, the folks in charge would have to be comfortable with introducing a type of socio-economic diversity into the game, particularly in the administration, business, and marketing areas, that has not been there to date.

Having everyone (or nearly everyone) in a culture, society, or community being deeply passionate about soccer has some serious drawbacks as well, just read Simon Kupers "Football Against the Enemy" and you will see that football has been used as a force to commit great acts of evil in places where football loyalties run deep and people are very passionate about the game. Serbs I know say that the Bosnian/Serbian war started in 1990 with a Red Star/ Dinamo Zagreb match. Winnie Mandela and associates committed many crimes under the name of (what sounds very innocent to Americans) The Mandela United Football Club.



*Popularity is relative too. There are plenty of top flight teams in Holland, generally considered a football powerhouse, that have season average attendances basically on par with MLS attendances. Someday I would like to take the average season attendances in the top level of soccer in all the various countries, I would bet the US ranked higher than many would expect. In Franklin Foer's "How Soccer Explains the World" he spends a fair amount of time discussing how soccer in Brazil is actually pretty poorly attended even though every kid on the street can tell you the starting line-up of Chelsea or Real Madrid.

[Jose Luis Luviano]

-Dominicans, Puerto Ricans, Venezuelans et al have taken over baseball and baseball is doing better than ever.

-Lots of foreigners win on the PGA tour and we like golf.

-Americans in Michigan, Massachusetts, Minnesota and similar places like hockey and some Premiereship teams have more Americans than some NHL teams.

-There are lots of foreigners in the NBA and the NBA is pretty popular.

It's pretty obvious that I love a good conspiracy theory, but I'll save mine for a Real South Jersey post.

[Aerick]

Originally Posted by Old Ska

And I would even say that the continued marketing of American soccer towards suburbanites is not going to help soccer gain popularity in this country. I say market it to young, underpriviledged urban kids and then you will really see it take off. However, the folks in charge would have to be comfortable with introducing a type of socio-economic diversity into the game, particularly in the administration, business, and marketing areas, that has not been there to date.

I would imagine, from a capitalistic point of view, that marketing to suburbanites means more revenue for your advertising buck. Whereas marketing to "economically challenged" groups wouldn't produce that same scenario - at least not as immediately, and you may have to be a very patient person/company to see those results flourish as you mention.

I think it should be marketed to everyone, though during these times of financial strain on the MLS, they should market primarily to those who can bring in the most money the soonest. This is, of course, a business point of view. Perhaps there are those at MLS who also think of the future and are acting on it as you've indicated.

[Old Ska]

Originally Posted by Aerick

I would imagine, from a capitalistic point of view, that marketing to suburbanites means more revenue for your advertising buck.

Think Backstreet Boys and Spice Girls vs. Eminem and Snoop Doggy Dogg. All sell (or sold) lots and lots of records, and mostly to suburbanites. Oddly, Eminem and Snoop have had the most staying power in our culture.

My point is that in general in American youth culture you CAN market to suburbanite youth by marketing to urban youth but you really can't market to urban youth by marketing to suburban youth. I guarantee you that if soccer starts being important in urban culture it would take mere months before that crosses over into mainstream culture. My grandmother knows what Boo-yaa means (and a cartoon Colonel Sanders said it in a commercial!), and that is mostly because Stuart Scott picked it up from rap music and started using it on Sportscenter, and it spread from there.

MLS is in season 11, and in that time teams have done countless youth camps, family pack deals, etc. geared towards suburbanites (and predominantly white suburbanites). It probably works to an extent, but I would argue that it is time for teams to focus more on other populations, especially teams in the larger markets. I am not sure to what extent socio-economic (and maybe even racial) prejudice plays a role in all of this...I hope a very very small one but I'm not certain.

[Jose Luis Luviano]

Originally Posted by Old Ska

I am not sure to what extent socio-economic (and maybe even racial) prejudice plays a role in all of this...I hope a very very small one but I'm not certain.

-The Galaxy spent millions on Campos, Hermosillo & Hernandez.

-The Galaxy has Spanish language radio broadcasts 4 or 5 (too lazy to check) years before they had English language radio broadcasts.

-Consider the source and the timing; but Sigi Schmidt claims that he passed on drafting Eddie Johnson so he could draft Chai Bardales instead.

-Jose Botello, Marvin Quijano & Memo Gonzalez have been on the Galaxy roster at various times.

-The Galaxy could have hired a coach that did not set soccer back 30 years in this country and who did not finish last in front of a billion people; but instead they hired one who speaks excellent Spanish.

[Old Ska]

Originally Posted by Jose Luis Luviano

-The Galaxy spent millions on Campos, Hermosillo & Hernandez.

-The Galaxy has Spanish language radio broadcasts 4 or 5 (too lazy to check) years before they had English language radio broadcasts.

-Consider the source and the timing; but Sigi Schmidt claims that he passed on drafting Eddie Johnson so he could draft Chai Bardales instead.

-Jose Botello, Marvin Quijano & Memo Gonzalez have been on the Galaxy roster at various times.

-The Galaxy could have hired a coach that did not set soccer back 30 years in this country and who did not finish last in front of a billion people; but instead they hired one who speaks excellent Spanish.

I guess I am talking about marketing and marketing strategy more than on the field stuff. There is a small Spanish language component to many of the team's marketing strategies (for which I and my company are very grateful!) but even that is largely under-done (but I can't speak for LA or SJ as I have had no experience with either of them). It just looks like they do a ton because all other businesses in America have basically completely ignored this market.

[Jose Luis Luviano]

The Galaxy didn't advertise much in English or Spanish before Anshutz took over.

But after Uncle Phil took over, that improved, or so I understand.

Let's keep our conspiracy theories for where they belong.

War Real South Jersey.

[prk166]

I think the theory gives too much credance to the power of growing up playing soccer. Afterall, if that worked we would've had the MLS long befor WC94, right?

[knowwonnose]

Originally Posted by rslfutbolfan

As the number of children playing soccer in this country is raising quickly, I have to assume the number of children playing baseball and football is decreasing. What will happen in 10 years when these children are having children of their own?

Discuss......

Interesting theory. As one who works professionally with children and volunteers coaching both soccer and (another up and coming sport) lacrosse, I can tell you that it doesn't seem to me that the numbers playing those more "American" sports is dropping at all. I haven't reviewed any raw data on this matter, but it seems to me that the trend these days isn't to drop one sport for another. Rather, children pick up multiple sports and activities. For example, in the 70/80s when I was young, it was rare to see a child participate in more than one sport per season and perhaps one other activity (i.e., musical instrument). Now, that multiples and multiples of activity is encouraged.

On my current Jr. High level, club lacrosse team I only have a small handful of girls that play only lacrosse in this current season. One girl, on the extreme, plays on top of lacrosse, for her school soccer team, she cheers with both her school competitive cheer team and a club team, she takes dance lesson 2x per week, is a part of Upward Bound and is involved in some sort of social organization's trip to Australia. And, yes, she's my best scorer so we miss her when she has conflicts. I have countless other examples of girls playing softball with other sports, too.

This is an unhealthy but true trend for young people in American, which, on the one hand, benefits the growth of the sport. On the other hand, is going to lead our youth down a scary, uncharted road.

With regard to your friend's theory: I think there is some reality to Americans fear of "new", "different" or "foreign" aspects to soccer. Just as true is the frustration with building large stadiums for every sport (private enterprises) that comes along. Most communities can't beat huge MLB or NFL franchises at this, but they see smaller MLS as a target to make their point.