women's soccer final

[Unkotare]

Hurray for the Women's national Team!

There you go.

 

[Toro]

Hockey is actually experiencing a resurgence in popularity. It's fine that other people around the world really, really like soccer. Ok, fine. Go kick your ball and jog. Great. Americans don't, generally. "Everyone else loves it!" is not generally a persuasive argument for Americans. The strange thing is how upset some people from other countries get over the fact that we don't really see soccer as anything more than a mild form of exercise for small children. Of course, the relatively few Americans who just love soccer tend to be highly frustrated. They should just relax and enjoy their sport instead of tilting at windmills about it becoming a major pro event in this country.

I'm just looking at the numbers. The ratings for the last World Cup final far outstripped that of game 7 of the World Series. It was also 10x more than the last Stanley Cup.

World Series television ratings - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
World Cup TV ratings soar in USA
Why aren

Again, soccer isn't replacing baseball anytime soon, but when 25 million Americans watch the World Cup final, that shows there is a lot of room to grow.

I love hockey, but the NHL is primarily a regional sport. The league has, for the most part, failed to penetrate the US South. Atlanta left, Phoenix is bankrupt, Nashville is losing money hand over fist, and Florida, Carolina and Tampa are often playing in front of half-filled arenas.

Hockey has a ceiling in this country which is much lower than soccer. There are 50 million Hispanics in this country. 80,000 people showed up to watch Brazil v Mexico at Cowboy stadium a few months ago. The US national soccer team often draws 30k-40k for their World Cup qualifiers, more when they play Mexico. Something like 15 million kids play soccer in America, nearly 10x the number of kids playing hockey.

So when I look out 20-30 years, could soccer be more popular than hockey? Sure, maybe.

All that is fair enough, but bear in mind that the world cup happens once every four years (right?). It's like saying that swimming is a massively popular spectator sport in the US because so many people watch the swimming events in the olympics every four years.

If you are talking about TV ratings, attendance, the sales of team merchandize, etc. you also have to put college football and college basketball as well as NASCAR ahead of pro soccer in the US. It's pretty far down the list.

It is. But I'd also put those three sports ahead of hockey too.

 

[PredFan]

Show me the post where I 'bashed' soccer.

I suppose you think that this is you paying a compliment?

Hockey is actually experiencing a resurgence in popularity. It's fine that other people around the world really, really like soccer. Ok, fine. Go kick your ball and jog. Great. Americans don't, generally. "Everyone else loves it!" is not generally a persuasive argument for Americans. The strange thing is how upset some people from other countries get over the fact that we don't really see soccer as anything more than a mild form of exercise for small children. Of course, the relatively few Americans who just love soccer tend to be highly frustrated. They should just relax and enjoy their sport instead of tilting at windmills about it becoming a major pro event in this country.

That is not "bashing," that is a description. Soccer does involve kicking a ball and jogging, and for the vast majority of Americans their experience with soccer was limited to playing it (without a great deal of exertion) as small children. It is a safe and easy way for little kids to get some exercise. No bashing there.

Yeah, I don't think that anyone is believing this BS, least of all me.

 

[Unkotare]

I'm just looking at the numbers. The ratings for the last World Cup final far outstripped that of game 7 of the World Series. It was also 10x more than the last Stanley Cup.

World Series television ratings - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
World Cup TV ratings soar in USA
Why aren

Again, soccer isn't replacing baseball anytime soon, but when 25 million Americans watch the World Cup final, that shows there is a lot of room to grow.

I love hockey, but the NHL is primarily a regional sport. The league has, for the most part, failed to penetrate the US South. Atlanta left, Phoenix is bankrupt, Nashville is losing money hand over fist, and Florida, Carolina and Tampa are often playing in front of half-filled arenas.

Hockey has a ceiling in this country which is much lower than soccer. There are 50 million Hispanics in this country. 80,000 people showed up to watch Brazil v Mexico at Cowboy stadium a few months ago. The US national soccer team often draws 30k-40k for their World Cup qualifiers, more when they play Mexico. Something like 15 million kids play soccer in America, nearly 10x the number of kids playing hockey.

So when I look out 20-30 years, could soccer be more popular than hockey? Sure, maybe.

All that is fair enough, but bear in mind that the world cup happens once every four years (right?). It's like saying that swimming is a massively popular spectator sport in the US because so many people watch the swimming events in the olympics every four years.

If you are talking about TV ratings, attendance, the sales of team merchandize, etc. you also have to put college football and college basketball as well as NASCAR ahead of pro soccer in the US. It's pretty far down the list.

It is. But I'd also put those three sports ahead of hockey too.

True.

 

[Unkotare]

I suppose you think that this is you paying a compliment?

That is not "bashing," that is a description. Soccer does involve kicking a ball and jogging, and for the vast majority of Americans their experience with soccer was limited to playing it (without a great deal of exertion) as small children. It is a safe and easy way for little kids to get some exercise. No bashing there.

Yeah, I don't think that anyone is believing this BS, least of all me.

Your defensiveness has been noted.