what stops soccer from getting big in the usa?.....

i think its mostly because of money. clubs around here make you pay tons of money just to get on the roster and play for 1 season. its crazy.

What stops baseball from getting big in England?

Culture. For whatever reason, back in the 1800 & 1900's the game never really caught on here while Baseball did. Then there was Basketball & American Football and that occupied the majority of the "leisure time." Now Soccer is gaining momentum, but it will take a long time to even get to the level of ice hockey. I think it has a firm enough foot hold now that will allow for it to get as big as Ice Hockey, but I think that will be the plateau in this country.

Culture my boy, culture.

Sure, getting on a club team costs some money. But all you need to play is a ball and 6 to 22 people....you don't need a club, you just need a culture that would make it popular enough to support pickup games (kickabouts / peladas).

Culture. I completely agree.

Money - Quality Players time

I just think soccer needs more time. For whatever reason, this generation has come to grasp with soccer and its becoming one of the most popular sports. Other generations have missed the craze and haven't noticed the game. I think the '02 World Cup could have been the turning point for the real draw of fans. That team made a run in the biggest tournament and being an underdog in all their games gave Americans something to get behind to cheer for. That team got some attention, little steps in America but it has made more people realize really how big soccer is in the world. I think ultimately there is little in the way to stop soccer from being big. It will take probably 15 years to become the 4th biggest sport in America behind football, basketball, and baseball. And probably 25 years before it passes baseball. You have to remember 40 years ago, the top three sports were horse racing, boxing, and baseball. American interest evolve and take up new sports, soccer is on the rise, so naturally it will be next to step in the lime light while sports like hockey (plagued by the hold-out, probably won't ever recover) and baseball (plagued by steriods, and less fan support without the bonds playing) take a back seat, soccer will fill the void left behind.
Once USA wins the world cup, it will be one of the top three sports.
Culture is the reason why soccer will not be the same here as it is in Europe.

Cheers to that.

Maybe MLS will attract some attention..

But I mean, kids at my school and everything, when they see me carrying a ball everywhere I go, I always get asked the same question.

"Why do you like soccer? It's so boring, all they do is pass back and forth, and rarely score"


Blah

soccer is getting big

at least way bigger than it was no more than 10 years ago. unfortunately soccer is still way behind other sports, but now more and more little kids are playing.

with the development of the MLS and more quality youth programs, soccer will develop, although it still has a ways to go.



that happens a lot at my school. excepts kids are big fans of saying lawnfairies (baseball anyone????) or saying soccer is all just useless running.

one day...

Soccer as a game is one of the fastest growing sports here in America. Lots of people are playing soccer now and it is getting more and more respect as a sport instead of a snorefest of pointless running.

Soccer as a professional league and national competition like the US mens national team still have a long way to go. America is already saturated with professional sports, and I think you need a consistently strong US national team (Im talkin about multiple World Cup Wins) to divert the attention of the average American sports fan.

When people choose to follow their favorite sports team, most people choose by either picking their local team, or the best team. Since American has been traditionally inferior in the soccer world, people are not going to invest their time to follow their team since they feel they suck, and why bother watching a crappy team.

I agree with what one jrlm8 said, might be another 25 years before it gets big. Assume the US wins the World Cup in Germany, sure it will get alot of attention, but the euphoria will fizzle out, kinda like the Olympics, where gold medalists like Michael Phelps gets all the attention, but after the Olympics no one gives a crap.

As for the MLS, I dont think it will ever get big as other American sports, unless majority of the best soccer players in the world play in the MLS.

as josh said i believe its culture too.

I read once in Andy Townsends biography of USA 94 something which is a sweeping generalization, but one that has plenty of foundation in my book.

If you are tall, you play basketball, if you are quick, you will do athletics, if you are strong and quick, you will do American Football, if you are intelligent you will play golf, if you are none of the above, its baseball.

Now while soccer is a developing sport its still stunted by this mentality and the college jock mentality that soccer is pussy sport, or "gay. (strong talk coming from guys who slap each other on the ass after every play, but lets not get into that right now)

Thats my 2 cents, feel free to agree/disagree with me

It's been said many times but I agree it is the culture. America calls it "soccer" while the rest of the world says football...

Australia calls it soccer.

The name soccer was invented in England actually.

Totaly agree.

I have this one stupid friend and when he asked what my favorite sport was, first I said football, but then I remembered, he'd probably think I meant American football, so I said "no no, I mean, football as in soccer" And then he said: "Why? You're not Brasilian are you?" Probably the most retarded things anyone's ever said to me, because he wasn't even joking.


Yep, same here, but I also agree about the culture issue which influences the lack of good media coverage (where I live anyways). I think the last time I saw a decent bit of football mentioned in the papers, was when Liverpool won Champions League. Even for the Confederations Cup they only had tiny paragraphs that didn't really mention anything important. When I moved to Toronto to go to school, I got to know my cousins a lot better, and one of the things that I introduced him to was football. He's always liked the sport, and (like many families where I live) his mum and dad just put him into football to get active when he was younger. But he was never seriously into the sport, so we ended up trying to figure out ways to watch more football on tv and such and I started teaching him more about it, and now he's hooked even though the only time we can watch la liga is on Sunday's very late at night -- practically Monday morning actually. But that's going to change this fall because he's thinking about getting satellite so we can get different channels.

in america, soccer is still considered a "girly" sport and many guys want to look all tough by playing football (american) so they dont bother with soccer. i think football is the main reason. ladies soccer is big over here though

In the US on tv poker is more popular than ice hockey and soccer....

If you didnt notice theyre playing poker on tv becuse there isint hockey at the moment...

haha only a canadian person would notice that.

but i completely agree with the culture idea. alot of ppl are too ignorant to accept soccer as a sport. and alot of the really good atheletes in the states and canada have parents who played either baseball, football or basketball. most kids who play soccer now usualy have parents who played. and since so many parents plays football,baseball and basketball, their kids are usually gonna end up playing the same sport

I think that in 20 years soccer will be a bigger sport in America. More and more kids of families who dont like soccer are starting to play it and like it which will most likely make thier kids like it and so on.

The reason that Americans dont like it is because it is not a sport Americans created. Its not mainly because its a sissy sport although they say that. Rugby is not a sissy sport but they dont watch that. Baseball is way more boring than any soccer game and baseball has no physical contact(maybe once a game w/ the catcher) yet it is a major sport. Hockey is a very physical sport and it is usually made fun of for being a Canadian sport and criticized because less and less ppl are watching. There are so many sports that get recogniton in the US that are less physical and attractive than soccer. Soccer has more contact than basketball but most Americans refuse to believe that.

I would say that AMerica was built on the values of being different from Europe in every sense of the word. The less sophisticated culture, driving on the other side, disregard of the metric system and all the small nitty gritty details are an example of the "We are different from England" value that was started with the growth of America. Seeing soccer as something alien hence, started that way.

Nowadays, as Josh pointed out, it is just culture. It is just the way it's been for a long long time and it is always hard to change those things. Things are improving though. Interest in football is increasing slowly but it is at least increasing. More media interest and high number of immigrants is contributing to this. It will however, take more than 50 years for footie to become a big sport here.

Until then, it's no big deal. Football is the world's sport. It doesn't need America to survive.

you couldn't be more right if i ...umm

also because americans believe they are never wrong, not the ones on here though

I wish that the MLS was a better league, I wish the US got more recognition worldwide as a football "conmpetitor", I wish i could see proper football on TV instead of ESPN's outdoor Games or Drag Racing, I wish that I could see at least one highlight on Sportcenter of football for that matter, and I hope that football finally gains respect in America. All you europeans have no idea how hard it is to love a sport so much and have it constantly bashed. I turn on the Radio, Jim Rome talking about how football is a girls sport, I turn on the TV, comedians making fun of my sport, all I really want is people to understand how beautiful OUR game is.

Not anymore (I realise this was a really old post, but Australia have recently officially changed the name to football, and their FA is now called the "Australian Football Federation. Just America to go ).

It will never ever be called football here in the US. We'll just keep calling it by the English name of Soccer.

i agree with what everyone here has said, and another reason real football gets no respect here is because most americans are fat obese lards who sit around all day and wait for something to happen. american football is the main sport overhere, and many of the guys that watch it or play it are big "tough" guys. now dont get me wrong, i play many different sports and watch american football, but i think it just takes over the other sports.

i would have to say it is the espn soccer announcers.
and alex a lalas(SP?) who thinks he is soccer god from US

i think his first name is alexi

yeah its alexi lalas

no the problem is that you have too many kids wanting to play soccer rather than football (american football) and that pisses off all the football fans

so then soccer has to be stupid

The reason Soccer/football isn't popular here is the culture. Football will never make it big here because it has no roots. The MLS doesn't have a connection with the cities/towns they represent.

Look at Argentina, how did football become so big there? It is a country which is pretty similar to the United States, made up mostly of European immigrants who came in mass numbers about 100 years ago.

The reason is that those immigrants created clubs in their local areas. The italians created Boca Juniors in La Boca, the Spaniards created Independiente, and the English created River. (Sorry if its not exactly right, but its a good example I think). These clubs grew over time into institutions and a national league was eventually created.

This is what should have happened in the United States. I have played for a couple of clubs here in New York. I played for College Point SC (Queens, NYC) which was Founded by Germans Immigrants in 1927. I also played for Auburndale SC, Little Neck SC, and now Manhattan SC. All these local clubs, which compete in local youth leagues such as Long Island Juniors, Cosmopolitan League, Westchester Youth League and the Y-League should have also created semi-professional sides and leagues years ago. These leagues eventually expand and join together and after some time a national league emerges with real roots in the communities they developed in. Imagine today if in New York, there was one professional club based out of the Long Island Juniors league, and another based out of the Cosmopolitan league. These clubs would have their youth systems already in place, stadiums and a real connection with the communities who grew up playing for these clubs.

The MLS is not this at all. It was created by a few millionaires who try but never will created the kind of fan loyalty that you see in Europe. Also the lack of stadiums and well the American culture makes this dream almost impossible. But hopefully we will see a growth of the MLS to where each team has its own management, youth systems and integration into the community. Wouldn't mind if they made an MLS team here based in Queens. There would be a nice little rivalry between New York SC and the New Jersey Metrostars. Seeing the popularity of soccer here in queens amoung the large latino, Italian, and Greek communities, I wouldn't expect there to be a problem with attendence.

It's not american made.

^^^^true

Baseball, American Football and Basketball are all American Made.

"grass fairies"... thats what they use at my school... lol

Baseball...rip off of rounders
American football...divergence from football (Much like rugby is)
Basketball....netball with bouncing

I'd hardly call them American invented, American pioneered and loved maybe but the Americans were hardly thinking when they made their national games, they just ripped off already existing games.

I think the problem with football getting big in America is simply because there are already established sports which are like a tradition now, football has just been too late to the American scene really.

and also, even the people who like socce rin america, usally are obsessed with the Euro Scene, not the american scene, myself included.

On a side note, basketball was invented by a Canadian.

Mr. Naismith is from up here (Canada)

Just a quick 2 cents

i think every1 in canada and the US should deserve a pat on the back for the support we show towards soccer.. i get picked on quite a bit at my school for this.. but i know that soccer is the best sport in the world. the best part about this is that our soccer team has 3 wins, 0 draws, and 1 loss.. while the football team at our school (who every1 cares about.. u know.. the football jocks get all the attention) are at 1 win and 2 losses.. it feels pretty cool to be on top of them even if we dont get the respect we deserve.. were underneath the football team.. play without any supporters on the sidelines.. but are doing very well and should win everything this year.. cant wait to rub it in their faces...

Soccer

^^^ Thats cool man.

My high school doesn't have an american football team, therefore we are known as "the football team". Its cool, were as close at it comes to jocks but such thing doesn't exist in most city schools.

our school is actually pretty small.. so there arent really any jocks.. but i used that term to state that most of the people that play american football get all the attention and look like the main athletes of the school.

hgaha yeha same here, our soccer team is number 2 i(16 wins -0 losses-2 draws) in the state, and our football team is 3-4 in a shitty ass conference, plus they lost our home coming game

well.. ours won our homecoming game

but we only have 6 games in our season and then playoffs
i wish we had 16

Interesting. I didn't know that.

Don't you think Adu, if he gets big will contribute popularity towards soccer in America couse then they a player that can actually compete with world class player, couse if you choose Beasley or Donovan as the best American player that's pretty poor...

I think Adu is like a "Beckham". Wait, let me explain because me and my sis were talking about this the other day. Where I live, sometimes I'll see someone walking around in an England, Man Utd, or Real Madrid shirt. And sometimes depending on where I am it's really rare for me to see anyone in a football shirt all day so sometimes I stop and ask them something like "where'd you get your shirt" "who's your favorite player" "how do you think they're doing this year." etc. just really really general questions right. And 8 out of 10 times, the person tells me that Beckham is their fav. player and will say something along the lines of "I don't want soccer that often but that guy Beckham he's amazing etc." Same thing with Adu, there have been several times when I'm introduced to someone getting to know them, I ask them what sports the watch, when they ask me I say I watch [football] soccer and they usually end up talking about "man that guy Adu is so young, you heard about him?" and him and Beckham are really the only players I can talk to them about. Which is one of the reasons why I think some people think Beckham's so overrated -- but I remember reading a post from someone in the Active Players Forum and they said that they thought "That people think Beckham is so overrated that he's actually becoming underrated". I found that interesting. Anyways, sorry got a little off topic, but to many people he's already one of the only players in the MLS that people who don't play the sport recognize and from what I've seen/heard he's already pretty popular here but not in the sense of "I want to get more interested in football", more in the sense of "When I buy a football shirt I'm going to have either his or Beckham's name on the back just because I want a football shirt, but don't necesarily want to watch the actual sport".. does that make sense?
When I went to school a lot of the guys on or off the team (which eventually got cut by the time we reached year 12 due to insufficent funding.. ie, our grass was so gross and dead and ... well, non exsistant, that they couldn't spend the money to continue busing the players to an actual field to practice so just cut the sport out completely) wore football shirts just because. They didn't watch the sport or take an interest in it unless it was the World Cup, but it was a "thing" to wear football shirts so they did, and it was 90% Beckham or Adu on their backs.. or it was blank the other 5% of the time. So.. I think I'm trying to say that Adu is already popular (at least here) but it's not exactly helping the fan base grow.. it's just wadding the pockets of the stores that sell the shirts.

^ If they identify with Adu, they indentify the league right, they know we have a league atleast? (We are better off than hockey then, jk)
Henceforth the league is growing. Who gets the money from the jersey sale? MLS gets their cut. The freddy factor is a great thing for American soccer. He sold out almost every game DC United played last year. That is a player that is bigger than the league for you.
Disregardless of opinions on the skills of Freddy, he is a marketing tool, and his comparision to Beckham is dead on. I went to the Real game in LA, you look around the stadium and pretty much everyone with a Real jersey was rocking a beck on the back. (For the record, I was wearing my Galaxy Jersey.) So yes Beckham and Adu are marketing tools but Freddy may have had an enourmous effect on this league which in turn helps american soccer grow. Ten years this league has survived, and they are beginning to expand again, if they can last for 15 more years. MLS and American soccer will be here forever.
Everyone should check out the new Nike Ad. The new Don't Tread on Me campaign. Here is just a quote from it:
" This is soccer. A game for the flag waving, tax paying, apple pie eating, Star Spangled banner singing, red blooded American.
So says this American game."

Soccer is catching on in America. Its just a matter of time til we will be able to claim it as one of the top 3 sports. 17,000,000 people play soccer, thats more than the population of Holland and Portugal. Just wait til these AYSO'ers grow up and become soccer fans. You will see soccers true light in America.

So do I. It is a pretty close comparison.
I agree jrlm8, it's just a matter of time.

American Football, it is so obvoius, everyone in the U.S. thinks that football (soccer) is a girl's sport.. it definetely isnt.

^That's a pretty big overgeneralisation by the way.
Plus, in North America, football is mostly seen by many as a recreational things that moms with minivans take their kids to to get them into groups and keep them fit (hence the term "soccer mom" and all those minivan commercials where a mother is carpooling all the little kids around to their games)

Jesus Christ, that gets on my nerves!!!!!!!1

Settle down all. Thanks.

I don't see anything wrong with it, it's one of the best sports to get your kids active and keep them from getting lazy at such an early age, besides, some like it so much they decide to continue so what's the problem...