October 08, 2012

Cascadia Cup: In front of a national audience on ESPN with a 66,000 plus crowd last night Seattle beat Portland 3:0 in MLS competition. When will the national mainstream media, both print and electronic, give the sport the recognition it deserves? For instance the LA Times with two teams MLS teams in LA doesn't even list soccer in its sports section banner. Just one of many examples.

posted by trueblueroo to soccer at 08:48 AM - 10 comments

Somebody want to start by telling me what a Cascadia Cup is?

posted by phaedon at 11:47 AM on October 08, 2012

Thou Shalt Not Editorialize In A Front Page Post.

trueblueroo, it's not clear whether you want this thread to be about the Cascadia Cup or about the national mainstream media not reporting on soccer. The cited article is about the former.

posted by lil_brown_bat at 11:53 AM on October 08, 2012

Seattle has an awesome MLS supporter community. Sorry, goddam, but if the Red Bulls could draw like the Sounders RBA would be much larger. I wish the Earthquakes had anywhere near this level, though hopefully we'll win the MLS Cup and roll that into many sellouts next season at the new stadium.

posted by billsaysthis at 12:11 PM on October 08, 2012

Considering how many Hispanics live in SoCal, I'm surprised that soccer doesn't have a more prominent place on the LA Times sports section.

I think the sports media attention to soccer has grown substantially in recent years. ESPN shows Premiership matches every Saturday morning, EPL scores are included in the crawl and U.S. international matches are always covered heavily.

The MLS has the disadvantage of competing with the EPL, La Liga and international soccer along with other U.S. sports.

posted by rcade at 12:14 PM on October 08, 2012

Phaedon, the name relates to the Cascades mountain range on the eastern side of Washington and Oregon.

One problem, unfortunately, is a long-standing belief among some naysayers that soccer is just a bunch of foreigners running around in shorts. I believe another is the lack of local exposure at lower levels given the PDL has so few clubs relative to the country's size.

Build up levels in the PDL, based on the European system (I'm familiar with the English pyramid), which would create more clubs, and bring soccer to more people at the local level. That might allow for their interest in the sport to develop.

posted by jjzucal at 01:37 PM on October 08, 2012

I think largely that national media will continue to do what they've always done. It's more difficult to change these larger institutions than smaller ones. The larger ones will change when they're forced to - usually they're the last to acknowledge a change in the winds.

posted by WeedyMcSmokey at 05:23 PM on October 08, 2012

Sorry, goddam, but if the Red Bulls could draw like the Sounders RBA would be much larger.

No need to apologize. I wish we drew numbers like that as well.

We have a whole list of things working against us, from competing with 9 other pro teams during various parts of the season to incompetent ownership/front office. The advertising budget that the mothership in Austria gives to RBNY is embarrassing for the NY Metro market. This year RB North America has been helping out on the marketing end, but they don't know shit about the sport. As a 'thank you' to supporters they sent everyone a can a Red Bull in the mail. With the money they spent on that mailing they could have helped us out with tifo funds or bus trips.

Sorry for the rant. It's been a frustrating year (which has sadly been the case for the last 17 years.)

posted by goddam at 05:28 PM on October 08, 2012

tifu?

posted by billsaysthis at 11:44 AM on October 09, 2012

tifu?

Tifo

Some MLS examples.

posted by goddam at 12:55 PM on October 09, 2012

That's handy, since now I know what word they were talking about on last week's Football Weekly Extra. According to AC Jimbo, it's derived from "typhus", though his explanation had the feel of a folk etymology.

posted by yerfatma at 01:57 PM on October 09, 2012

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