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Who's David Beckham? We have a soccer league here?

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I like Beckham, and I think he is moving to improve the game's appeal in the U.S., though it has to be said that he really had no other options. Real Madrid had loads of problems, and they basically dropped him for most of this season. In fact, after the move's announcement, the Real Madrid manager announced that Beckham had played his last game there, essentially putting him on the sidelines for the rest of the season. He really couldn't go back to England unless he wanted to player for lesser teams (Newcastle, Tottenham, etc...), so bascially anything he would have done in Europe would have been a major step down.

I don't think it will change soccer's image, however. I've always felt it must be problematic to show on television in the U.S. because there really isn't much room for adverts. There is time in the pre-match buildup, but once it kicks off, there is 45 minutes straight of playing. 15 minutes during the half, where there certainly needs to be punditry for a portion of that time, then another 45 minutes without a break.

The MLS has tried some really stupid and desperate rule changes over the years (even doing away with draws at one point) to make it appeal more to Americans, and I really hope they don't mess with the game length to put more adverts in.

Add to that the ludicrous news coverage and editorials I caught during the World Cup. One opinion article ranted about how soccer was intrinsically unAmerican, because America is an industrious society where people use their hands, and any game that doesn't include the use of hands is unAmerican, etc... I remember an ABC news report from Germany where the correspondent was trying to explain how big the World Cup is throughout the world, and he asked a few Europeans "is the World Cup the biggest sporting even in the world?" To which they replied in unison, "YES!", and then he added, "even bigger than the Super Bowl?" and they just looked at him like he was a moron.

I think it has a long way to go before it gets out of the image of being the sport for girls or young children.

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I think it won't really affect the MLS at all. Sure, there will be more media coverage (at least in the beginning) but a) is Beckham an overhyped player who is past his high-time and b) will one decent player alone not improve the quality of the league. It still will be a pain in the a** to watch a whole 90-minutes game when the quality isn't there. I am a HUGE football-fan from Germany and I freely admit that there are matches in the Bundesliga (still in the world's top5 leagues) that you should be paid to watch. They are THAT awful. But then again I still would choose these matches over watching American Football or Baseball which I feel have too many breaks, football/soccer almost hasn't any breaks at all (apart from kick-offs, corners ...).
What the MLS could really use is many average players from around the world to improve the overall quality. And still this might be a problem since all of these players will be foreigners. They will be from South America, Africa, Europe and not many will know them. People just know Beckham because he and his wife are celebrities offside the court. I bet you all my possesions that not even 10 percent know about his qualities as a football-player. And there aren't that many apart from some nice free-kicks...

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Soccer is a game played by 8th grade school girls. It will never be more than that in the US. I didn't even know there was a pro-soccer team in the US.

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When exactly was soccer "huge" in the U.S.? You cite two times that it might have caught on, but failed.

A washed-up European player isn't going to provide any more than tabloid and single-season interest in the U.S.

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That's pretty exciting. Anyway, perhaps he did it to get AWAY from his ridiculous fame in Europe? It must be overwhelming. I wonder if Posh will move here with him! :P

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Having Beckham come to the states will boost the visibility of the game in the US, it won't improve the quality of the teams overall. The European Leagues are tough, the competition is fierce and they play at a whole different level. Anyone who wants to become a name in soccer goes to Europe, anyone who wants to play and isn't up to European levels plays here. Until MLS competition is on the same level as European, the Americans will never be a real playing in World Cup games.

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First off nASCAR has only been big in the last few years or so, and is hardly engrained... Only because of the brilliant marketing and selling of it by the guy who's name I forget who owns it now.

Soccer COULD be big in this country.. And it should be. It's a great game, and I hope Beckham moving here will open it to the rest of you people.

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Honestly, and it's not an insult, in my opinion, culturally, Americans have difficulty getting behind anything that requires you pay attention for long periods of time. The most popular sports in the country, football, baseball, and basketball, have all the real action in short bursts (basketball to a lesser extent, but in most cases the first three quarters of a basketball game are disposable and the game is almost always decided in the last 5 minutes). Soccer is a more tactical game, and most people have difficulty following the play, or even knowing what's going on the first few times they watch. In most of the world, that isn't a problem, as the sport is such a big part of the culture that people get swept away by the energy and the understanding of the game develops after watching a few matches. In the USA, soccer isn't really a part of the culture, so that opportunity isn't really there. Of course I'm biased as I'm completely in love with the sport, though in my defense I use to watch Baseball and Hockey religiously. Like any sport, the best teams make the game exciting. Don't watch the first five minutes of a Sheffield v West Ham match and call the sport boring.

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First, the name is "Cobi."

On-topic, well, I'll put it bluntly: soccer won't join the pantheon of "accepted" American sports until those born before and during the 1960's have died.

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Loved soccer when I was a kid. But I grew up and now I watch football. (In fact, I didn't really watch it as a kid either; just played it.)

This has been tried before. They brought in Pele towards the end of his career to try to get people interested in soccer in the '70s. Didn't work then and it has less chance of working now.

If they set their sights low, it could be a fine move. They put him in L.A. where he can be a player and celebrity and where there is a large Hispanic population. Not sure Beckham is a huge draw south of the border, but soccer in general is.

And hey, Hockey is barely relevant anymore. Maybe they can pass them.

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I enjoyed MLS when it first started, and have been to several DC United Games. But, it's hard to watch it on television after getting used to the top-notch production qualities of the World Cup. The camera is far too close to the pitch when watching MLS productions - you don't get a good sense of attacks being set up, etc.

The game certainly won't be changed to make room for adverts. The rules for the MLS game is also now very close to the game rules approved by FIFA.

Soccer's a great sport to watch if the coverage is good. And there's a story to tell. There's not much of a story to tell in a league with 10 or 12 teams that play each other over and over again in a long, long season.

I think Americans would appreciate the sport more if they saw how it was covered elsewhere. I mean, if they could see the high production values you get when watching an English Premiereship match. Many digital cable packages have Fox Soccer Channel (formerly Fox Sports World) which is an excellent place to start.

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It's a chicken-egg scenario. The reason soccer isn't "bigger" and more commercially viable here in the U.S. is that it isn't shown on network TV. Nobody in their right mind would argue that hockey is more popular, or that more people play hockey than soccer. Yet hockey is more televised. You can't tell me that golf is more exciting, yet golf is more televised. Etc., etc.

Unfortunately, soccer will never be shown on network TV, because there isn't enough space for ads. There are no ad breaks, and the on-screen advertising doesn't bring in enough revenue. Networks can't get huge ad contracts to support giving up two hours of airtime. Sure, they could charge a ton for banners etc., but advertisers won't pay because "nobody watches." But nobody watches because it's not televised, etc. etc.

I mean there are other factors too, like Mike Farrell's attention span point or adhonus' drama point, but the biggest is that you can't flip on most TVs and catch a soccer game. You won't any time soon, either, and David Beckham isn't going to change a thing about that.

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Tucker - soccer fans can be grateful that ESPN/ABC has been a willing partner in putting the sport on television, without commercials. They've been committed to it for years, and from what I can recall, got decent ratings in the past World Cup. Not stellar ratings, but they provided a public service to a world event. But then again, World Cup is like the Olympics - it's an event that a niche audience is going to appreciate. And it's an audience that is going to grow.

But, every four years isn't enough to grow a major sport. Hopefully Beckham's tenure in the U.S. will help a little. I don't know if it's worth $250 million, though.

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Becks isn't washed up by any stretch; he's 31 and can still play. One of the big things that one sportswriter pointed out is that Beckham can still put the ball in the net, which is important. Americans, for the most part, like offense. They don't understand the beauty in a 1-0 game.

All that said, one man can't do it all. Is anyone going to watch the MLS when two other teams are playing?

I'd also note that American commentating teams for soccer are apocalyptically horrific. Anyone reading this probably would be a better soccer commentator than Marcelo Balboa.

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Im from England (now in Canada) and a Man Utd fan. The only positives of Becks going to the US that I can see is that other players near the end of their careers may follow suit and come out there as well.
The likes of Ronaldo etc could all end up playing out there alongside him; this could cause the sport to boom. I think the kids growing up in this generation will get into football.
You can play football by yourself, anywhere, anytime with anything.

Becks should do well in the MLS league. He should be head and shoulders above the rest. If Kenny Dalglish's son Paul can do all right in the MLS Becks will be fantastic. The Premiership, which is the English league, was in a bad way at the start of the early 90's. We had just come off the end of a ban from all European competitions so our league consisted of mainly English players and we aren’t the most technically gifted!! lol
They renamed the league to what it is today and really pumped money into marketing to make the league respected in Europe again and draw in players. We started off with many players over 30 at the end of their careers coming over to pick up one last big pay day and it has progressed from there. We now attract more of the bigger names and all four of our Entree's into this years Champions League (European cup) are through to the last 16 of the comp, which is pretty good.
I don’t think Becks will change the sports appeal overnight but if the people at the top use him right they can use that as a stepping stone to increasing its popularity.
They also need to revise the way the league is organised. They should follow suit with every other decent league in the World and have a relegation zone so when the teams near the bottom play they actually have something worth playing for. A relegation fight can be just as exciting if not more exciting then watching two teams scrap it out for the title. You lose out on the title you still get another shot at it the next season. You get relegated to a lower division you have to move down a level and fight to get back into the top league the next season. They should also scrap the East vs. West playoff for the winners. Football is a different sport entirely to American Football and they shouldn’t try to package it up in the same way.
I like watching NFL but I tape all the games. I wont sit through that many commercials.
I pay to watch Sports not have commercials forced on me every other minute and i don’t want the game to break. Matches in the Prem can be end-to-end stuff.
We beat Reading the other day 3-2. We were 3-0 up within 6 minutes but they came back and gave us a hammering in the second half. I was literally on the edge of my seat all game. If it hadn’t been for the cross bar of the goal we would have had to have had extra time (overtime) as they went so close in the 86th min.

Also i don’t understand the people who hate on the sport of football (i read the same article Matthew mentioned) and bang on about American football and baseball. It’s easy to hate on any sport. Anyone can do it. They are just ignorant. Sports aren’t there to better then other sports. They should compliment each other. Every sport deserves a level of respect.
But just to show how easy it is to hate on other sports and doesn’t take a rocket scientist to do so, yet the people doing so think they are pretty clever,
I could say well who wants to spend three hours watching a sport that has more commercials then it does actual playing time?
How can a 350lb fat man be classed as an athlete and be a sports role model to kids?
Why are the winners of the Super Bowl classed World champions and Baseball called the World Series when they aren’t World competitions? In the actual Baseball World Classics the tiny Japs knocked the U.S. out. Doesn’t make sense to have the word World in there unless its a competition that is open to the World to play in (it illustrates the ignorance of the organisers of the sports).

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