Women's World Cup

[jimmy40]

Rousey was an anomoly. She could headline a PPV event and got paid accordingly.

then she got kicked in the face and quit

 

[Doomsday]

Rousey was an anomoly. She could headline a PPV event and got paid accordingly.

Yea, just like Conner McGregor etc. They fill the seats and sell PPV, so they deserve the money.

Just shows it is not about gender, it is about making your sport money.

 

[Doomsday]

What she leaves out is that she was heavily promoted to be successful. The Women's World Cup gets great ratings. The problem is the team isn't well promoted. Nike recently announced that the USWNT jersey was the best selling jersey in any year for a soccer jersey. Too bad they didn't start selling them before the World Cup... or have specific player jersey's available... or player jerseys available for specific players and in Men's sizes... These companies aren't promoting this team to their own detriment.

After 2015 Alex Morgan were stars. In 2019, Rapinoe, Morgan, Lavelle, Heath, Ertz, Dunn, are all reaching star status. If Hope Solo hadn't imploded, this team would have been even further along star-wise. Throw in Pugh who is a star in the making.

The other difference is people love MMA and the UFC and not many care about soccer except during the Olympics and World Cup.

She helped the UFC launch women's MMA at a time they didn't think it was viable.

I have watched every one of the men's and women's National team games for 10 years, but rarely if ever watch MLS soccer. Not sure I have never seen a women's league game and really don't have much of a desire to do so. I think that is pretty typical of a lot of fans.

 

[Galian Beast]

The other difference is people love MMA and the UFC and not many care about soccer except during the Olympics and World Cup.

She helped the UFC launch women's MMA at a time they didn't think it was viable.

I have watched every one of the men's and women's National team games for 10 years, but rarely if ever watch MLS soccer. Not sure I have never seen a women's league game and really don't have much of a desire to do so. I think that is pretty typical of a lot of fans.

You're basically making my point for me.

Who cared about women's MMA before Rousey? Just like there are those who don't think NWSL or women's soccer is viable. There is evidence to suggest that people will watch. What is so special about the olympics and the world cup? Promotion and advertising and star power. It's the same reason why no one watches MLS. America's best player does not play in MLS. That is good for the USMNT, but it is bad for MLS. The two are very much linked together.

If you look at the NWSL you will see it is very badly packaged and very badly promoted. Someone not having seen a women's league game isn't evidence that the desire isn't there, rather the product isn't what it needs to be in order to sell.

Let me give you an example of the difference between NWSL production and World Cup production:

NWSL


WWC

 

[Galian Beast]

And I'll bring up again that MLS currently only has 24 teams. They will be looking to add 6 more teams in the next few years, which will drastically expand their market (20% uptick in the number of teams and markets covered).

Once MLS is at full strength nationwide with a full roster of teams i.e. 30+ we'll see what pace of growth looks like. I could see them adding even more teams than that to be honest. The most difficult thing is keeping the quality high when it is already pretty low, but you see the youth movement in american soccer and there is a lot of talent that is the wings. If they hadn't blown qualifying last year, maybe we would have seen some real growth in the sport. Would have been the first chance people got to see Pulisic in a WC.

 

[erod]

FC Dallas has great turnout for games, and reasonable viewership. They've sold several youth players to Europe and are very much financially viable.

It's taken root, and now just needs time.

Young America detests baseball and is watching less and less NBA (which is a ridiculous mess) and zero hockey.

Soccer ratings for morning EPL games is rising steadily, and the 2-hour nature of those games with no commercials is appealing to young sports fans.

I believe soccer will eventually be the second sport to football in about 10 years.

However, pro women's soccer will always struggle. People just don't follow women's team sports.

 

[atlantacowboy]

You don't have to have european citizenship to play in europe and he was absolutely homegrown talent... Not sure what you're thinking of but he went to a soccer academy in the us.

Pulusic had the advantage of going to the Borussia Dortmund youth academy at age 16 as a croatian citizen, and that is the difference between him and the scrubs we see around him on the national team.

His passion for the game was fueled by living in England when he was young and a father who is a soccer fanatic. I don't think his development can be reproduced en mass is the point...........

 

[atlantacowboy]

Christian Pulisic is the first true American all star soccer player. If they can build the USMNT around him, he will inspire the nation like no player before him. He is only 20, so we should have him for at least 10 more years and two world cup tournaments, maybe even 3.

Baseball used to be America's past time. Things change.

I hope you are right. I much prefer soccer to baseball and basketball, but there just isn't enough of it on tv. It is not promoted domestically very well.

I think Pulisic will struggle on the national team stage b/c he's surrounded by players who aren't good enough to be on the same field. He'll be targeted and is already oft injured at age 20.

 

[erod]

Pulusic had the advantage of going to the Borussia Dortmund youth academy at age 16 as a croatian citizen, and that is the difference between him and the scrubs we see around him on the national team.

His passion for the game was fueled by living in England when he was young and a father who is a soccer fanatic. I don't think his development can be reproduced en mass is the point...........

McKennie plays for Schalke 04, Yedlin plays for Newcastle, and Brooks plays somewhere over there, too.

And there are some seriously good U20s on the way. They beat France recently.

 

[DFWJC]

I agree with Ronda, she gets it.

mic drop moment and THE bottom line on the issue

 

[atlantacowboy]

McKennie plays for Schalke 04, Yedlin plays for Newcastle, and Brooks plays somewhere over there, too.

And there are some seriously good U20s on the way. They beat France recently.

You gonna make me name all the clubs French players not just play on but star? I think its safe to say we are no threat to France. lol

I never said Pulisic was the only American playing in Europe.

 

[StylisticS]

One of the problems with US soccer is that it is very different than other countries in terms of how young athletes are developed.

Look at football for example. You have pop warner, middle school, high school, college, NFL.

That model doesn't work for international soccer. If you haven't been recruited and developed by the time you should be in middle school and high school, it's basically too late.

It means that the US can't really use colleges which have the proper funding to develop talent, so high schools and middle schools need to do it, which they really can't afford to do. So you have private travel leagues, which are extremely expensive and reduce the pool of available kids tremendously.

Tbh, if the US ever decides to develop the way South America and Europe does, even high school and middle school would be out. This sport is after school until an academy comes and gets you which could be as early as age 10. I do agree in principle though. You can’t do soccer Lieberman we do the other sports. Us trying to Americanize the sport is exactly the reason why the sport actually hasn’t grown more than it even has now over the past 30 years.

 

[Rockport]

then she got kicked in the face and quit

She’d kick yo ***.

 

[StylisticS]

FC Dallas has great turnout for games, and reasonable viewership. They've sold several youth players to Europe and are very much financially viable.

It's taken root, and now just needs time.

Young America detests baseball and is watching less and less NBA (which is a ridiculous mess) and zero hockey.

Soccer ratings for morning EPL games is rising steadily, and the 2-hour nature of those games with no commercials is appealing to young sports fans.

I believe soccer will eventually be the second sport to football in about 10 years.

However, pro women's soccer will always struggle. People just don't follow women's team sports.

I agree with most of your post except in bold. They really do not get great turnout. Their attendance is consistently near the bottom of the list. Houston has the same attendance problems and because of that, both Texas MLS teams are criticized for it. They even wrote an article about it.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2017/may/26/mls-texas-derby-houston-dynamo-fc-dallas

I don't know why Houston has problems but I can see why for FC Dallas. Compared to our football, soccer is an urban sport. Stadiums do not take up much space, public transit is used heavily and unfortunately, there's only one way to get to Toyota Stadium and that's by car. But on other forums like reddit, people constantly complain about how far the stadium is and it catering to suburban soccer moms. You also hear people in the DFW area say marketing is extremely bad to the point that people don't even know they have a team. It also doesn't help that the entire stadium isn't shaded. Let's be real, who wants to sit on the side where the sun is shining on you in Texas in the middle of July and August?

I will agree that most younger people will choose to watch soccer over baseball and hockey nowadays. It's very close to basketball with all demographics but to Black Americans, basketball is still by far number 2 if not number 1. However, even though soccer is becoming as popular as baseball and passed hockey to claim the number 4, the MLS isn't as popular as the NHL or MLB let alone the NBA and the NFL and the revenue shows that. MLS revenue is getting closer to a billion though.

 

[jimmy40]

She’d kick yo ***.

 

[Rockport]

She’d still kick yo ***.

 

[jimmy40]

Rousey's the most overated anything ever

 

[jimmy40]

She’d still kick yo ***.

well I will be 56 next week and I have long arms so I'd probably be in trouble, I mean that's what she was, an arm puller, right?

 

[Rockport]

well I will be 56 next week and I have long arms so I'd probably be in trouble, I mean that's what she was, an arm puller, right?

No she was a Mixed Martial Arts fighter. She’d kick yo ***.

 

[Galian Beast]

Pulusic had the advantage of going to the Borussia Dortmund youth academy at age 16 as a croatian citizen, and that is the difference between him and the scrubs we see around him on the national team.

His passion for the game was fueled by living in England when he was young and a father who is a soccer fanatic. I don't think his development can be reproduced en mass is the point...........

Tell that to Giovanni Reyna. All we need is enough to produce at the national level ONCE and you will get your mass reproduction.

Each generation will blow out the next generation if success is had.

The expansion of the developmental leagues which is exactly how we got pulisic. I say he is homegrown because he played in the developmental academy from 11-16.