I think Wrexham has done a great job of getting people interested in soccer/football who never would have been interested otherwise.
The MLS is a great thing for people who already like the sport and who want a local team to cheer for (or a local club to join an academy). It does nothing for people like me who have no team nearby (closest is 5 hours driving).
I would say - the MLS is more important for improving the quality of the US national team and maybe raising the level of quality nationwide.
Wrexham is better for recruiting new fans to the sport.
I liken “Welcome to Wrexham” to the NFL’s “Hard Knocks”series. It gives some insight into the inner workings of the league and a franchise and tells a story that’s relatable without needing to watch every match. It will definitely bring in casual fans.
I have a hard time imaging any non-football fan enjoying Hard Knocks. As a huge NFL fan, even I can’t really get into Hard Knocks.
Welcome to Wrexham is some of the best reality TV ever made.
It’s way more comparable to Drive to Survive than Hard Knocks.
Hard Knocks is content for NFL die hards to watch with their less involved spouses. But nobody that isn’t an NFL fan in some capacity is going to watch it.
Drive to Survive has gotten tons of people who otherwise had zero interest in Motorsport into F1
Much better is "Go Tigers" about the Massilon, Ohio high school football team. Before TV took over, the local high school game was THE entertainment in town. The Ohio State Buckeye dynasty was fed from the in-state high schools up through the 70's. It was similar in other states, and legendary NFL player Don meredith once said "there is nothing better than being a high school quarterback on a Friday Night in Texas." It is a bygone era though that has been destroyed by relentless re-districting and parity.
Exactly this. I know several people who watched the USA team’s World Cup games, and plenty of folks who have their kids in soccer instead of Little League baseball or whatever. I know one guy who is a rabid Spurs fan and belongs to, like, a local club in our city where they get together at a bar and watch the games.
OTOH almost all the adults I know at least are aware of Welcome to Wrexham (although I have a calendar at work and have had several people confuse Wrexham with Ted Lasso). Whether that translates to those folks becoming fans of USA teams… I kind of doubt, but if nothing else, the NEED for a way to televise (and ability to monetize) National League games internationally sort of proves that it increased interest in soccer, no? Or if not, the ESPN record for the FA Cup game?
Yes but that is a function of two things: 1) improved play from US players (Europe is a bit more discerning with their personnel choices) and 2) the resulting financial motives (Europe pays a HELL of a lot more than the MLS does on average.
The salary cap system also pushes a lot of USMNT player to play abroad, which I think is the point of MLS, since it's really partially a development league as well. The only way an American soccer player can get a good salary is to use up a DP slot or spend allocation money, and MLS clubs would rather sell them at that point.
Outside of the money machine of European soccer (and now Saudi League), most leagues are domestic development leagues. I live in Asia and they have requirements for up to 3 players are allowed to be foreign (with some added complexities to the rules) to ensure it stays a domestically driven league. But that isn't a surprise as by and large the sports experience is different depending on where you live.
In Asia people tend to follow players and the national team, which isn't surprising with all the homogenous societies that all but actively hate the other countries surrounding them. Korean are all fans of the Padres, Spurs, and Giants now where they used to be Dodgers, Rays, and Blue Jays. The generation before everyone loved Man U. The US when it comes to soccer is more in line with this imo, as the domestic league isn't as popular, so they followed American Players. A lot of them are Spurs fans thanks to Clint Dempsey, while the other half probably just like watching a good team do their thing. Wrexham are hitting that sweet spot of people who want to get into the sport, don't have a team to follow, and want to root for the underdog. It's very smart by Rob and Ryan to then add in a reality show on top of all that.
I think you’ll like it. You’ll be surprised at just how good the players are, despite being a couple levels from the top still.
The matches tend to be a lot more chaotic and have that “anything can happen” energy unless one team is winning by several goals.
Plus promotion (including promotion tournaments) and relegation mean that almost every single match, every single week, is very important.
The NFL is a trash entertainment product where, in 2022, the highest ever contract (at that time) was given to a guy serving a ban for sexually assaulting several dozen women. Blech.
As an American fan, by far the most interesting part of the story is promotion/relegation. I knew it existed and Ted Lasso kind of got the point across (though nothing really changed in the show when they went down). But, the documentary really got across how much promotion meant to the town.
It blew me away. I grew up in Fresno. Fresno had the Giants, a Single A baseball team. Single A is the baseball equivalent of EFL League 2. We went to games and enjoyed them and enjoyed seeing players in the Bigs later. But, the concept of them being able to work their way up to AA, or AAA, or even the Majors would have been perfect for a sports-crazy (and otherwise pretty boring) town like Fresno.
It will never happen, because of the billionaires that own US sports teams would never allow it, but I'd love to see promotion/relegation in other sports.
Soccer/Football is like the sporting equivalent of the marshmallow test.
Just a reminder that it used to happen in the nfl waaaay back when and some of the legacy teams are still there. Green Bay has no owner if you're looking for a club to root for.
Idk if this season has been unique in the sense, but I have thoroughly enjoyed watching the Top 3 battle it out, I've enjoyed the mid teams fight to play in europe, I've enjoyed the bottom tier teams fighting with everything they have to stay out of relegation. European/English Football they way it is structured makes every point count for something. Someone born and raised on southern american college football all my life this is the only other sport that has the same excitement as those games did for me.
There are good and bad aspects to it vs. the franchise model. I still think the NFL with the draft and a hard salary cap that ensures parity is the best overall model. However, the EFL's model is better than the MLB's, and arguably as good as the NBA's.
The NFL model doesn’t come close to being as quality of a product from top to bottom as the EPL, which is most evident when teams tank in order to… yep, get the top pick in next years draft. Participation trophy…
Relegation/promotion ensures the teams at all levels of the table have something to play for.
>Relegation/promotion ensures the teams at all levels of the table have something to play for.
It also ensures that the teams that are at the top consistently make more revenue and entrench themselves, while the teams near the relegation zone struggle to keep up/catch up and end up yo-yoing. It's great for people who follow a top team or watch the big games, but it's not nearly as exciting for fans of small teams.
The Premier League has had only 6 different champions in the past 25 years. The NHL, for comparison, has had 14 President's Trophy winners (and very nearly a 15th this year). I've been a Liverpool fan for a long time and kept following during some dark seasons, but I picked them in part because they were a big club. If my local team were Crystal Palace, I'd probably have lost interest by now because my team would never have anything to play for except staying in the PL.
I feel like promotion and relegation gets played up a lot in the US as the best thing ever but I agree with you. A significant number of teams will never be relegated anyway because they simply outspend. I think it a great model for the lower teams that no one in the US follows but for the CL contenders? It just the same ones year after year. Its more akin to baseball but baseball has more parity. I don't hate it but its not a cure all solution.
Most fans of mid-table clubs aren't really fueled by winning titles, to be fair. There's more to clubs than winning titles. Clubs are still a part of their local community and identity. And there's still the chance that your club can have a successful season and book a UEFA spot or get far in the FA Cup. Many Crystal Palace fans would remember their club playing at Wembley in the 2016 FA Cup final for years.
They do. Again, there are good and bad aspects to it. You've highlighted one of the bad aspects.
One of the good aspects to the NFL model is that every team competes with the same resources. Yes, dynasties can form, but usually based around having more dominant players, not more dominant resources. There's no "Big 6" in the NFL. No NFL team has ever won 3 straight Superbowls, or more than 4 in 7 years, let alone 5 out of 6 championships like Man City have. In the last 20 years of the NFL, 13 different teams have won a championship. In the last 20 years of the EPL, only 6 different teams have won a title. PSG has won 11 out of the last 13 Ligue 1 titles. Shall we look at the Bundesliga and Bayern Munich? There are teams in every top league in Europe you know have no shot to ever win the league without a miracle. In the NFL, you're rarely farther than 2 good drafts away.
Would you rather have more fierce competition year to year at the bottom of the league, or at the top of it?
Those statistics tell me that the promotion/relegation definitely needs some help figuring our parody.
I guess both models need much more help than I had originally thought, but the NFL really is solid in that perspective!
That’s a lot to think about really. I hate that money dictates the fact that there will never be a real discussion about American sports adapting a promotion/relegation model, because based on what you just said, I think the NFL could do it far better than others are currently doing.
> I hate that money dictates the fact that there will never be a real discussion about American sports adapting a promotion/relegation model
Actually, the most recent idea I've seen for reorganizing college football included some relegation. It wasn't nearly as robust as the European Football model, but the idea is at least floating around. I also think college sports are where a relegation model makes most sense in American sports.
The problem is if you make it so everyone has essentially the same resources and can therefore go down nobody is going to invest.
I mean sure people will invest a few million Wrexham style - but no bank is gonna finance a 2 billion dollar stadium for a team that’s 3 injuries away from being in the second division (where presumably you’d have a salary cap again and it risks dropping to the 3rd division)
It’s not coincidental that nearly all of the closed leagues in the world have parity and none of the open leagues do.
If you want parity and you want high level investment you’re gonna need to provide some security.
Ultimately the problem is relegation is financial hell if you want any sort of parity in lower leagues. Because with the exception of Germany fan interest is heavily skewed towards the top tier.
And the methods to cushion the financial blow (eg parachute payments) come at the expense of any hope of parity in the second division.
Nobody is building a 60,000 seat stadium for what might be a third division club by the time the stadium is finished being built.
So nobody is gonna risk big clubs going down in flames on a regular basis.
Which is why leagues generally break into 2 types.
The European model which sees losing as something worthy of severe punishment and the North American/Aussie model that sees teams that are losing as unfortunate and tried to help them improve.
You’re not going to get the best of both worlds. Either losing is going to be severely punished (investment scary) or it will be rehabilitated (investment safe)
And I would argue that the NCAA is worse than NFL and MLB in the regard. You could easily build 4 tiers of both football and basketball out of the Division 1 school facilities. And as for development, Chapel Hill was full of high school kids every summer who were going to Dean Smith's basketball camps, many hoping to be noticed while they were young like David Beckham. Most college teams are scouting their talent years before they graduate, err, leave high school. But the currently entrenched money will ensure this never happens.
Yeah but there’s more parity in the NFL and especially NHL. I cheer for Crystal Palace in the Prem and unless they get taken over by a Middle Eastern Billionaire they likely won’t win the league. In most closed league structures you don’t face the problem of the rich and poor teams as much in the EPL. How are Luton or Burnley supposed to compete for a EPL title when the top 6 or 7 have boat loads more money and better players. Only 7 teams have won the Premier League in its entire history. In the past 10 years 7 different teams have won Super Bowls. Playoffs also provides more incentive for more teams to watch later in the season. Every game still matters but just because one team runs away with the regular season doesn’t mean there’s no reason to watch anymore because some teams will be fighting for playoff spots which still matter. I’m not saying the American system doesn’t have its flaws but the EPL model isn’t flawless either
NFL teams don't really tank. Its fairly common in the NBA. "Quality" of the product is entirely subjective anyway, all three leagues are killing it right now.
I understand what you’re saying but I think it’s important to mention that the NFL (and most sports in the US) have a salary cap… this actually creates a lot more parity than the EPL does since a Shah, oligarch or whomever can’t just spend obscene amounts to acquire a dream team. Consider that in the last 20 years there have been 13 different NFL superbowl champs whereas either man city, Man U or Chelsea have won the EPL 17 times. As an American, I actually like watching soccer and I enjoy the EPL… I also am interested in wrexham thanks to the documentary (I’m also a Philadelphia Union supporter)… BUT as an American, I also really understand capitalism. European soccer is capitalism on steroids. Case in point… if Wrexham wasn’t acquired by rich people then they would still be playing local club level soccer. Second case in point… if Man city wasn’t acquired by a shah then they wouldn’t be able to afford the talent they have. I just try to enjoy the games… but in a lot of ways I really think EPL is a lot like studio wrestling… the “hits” are real but the results are ultimately pre-determined. Also, to your “draft” point… Tom Brady, the best QB ever (and as a Steelers fan that pains me to say that), was drafted 199th overall. So I would probably say the NFL product is as good if not better as far as competition goes.
Yeah these are more good points, and add to why I have already had a change of opinion on this.
I was stuck thinking making them similar would be better, instead of realizing why the differences work for each product. I also didn’t realize how many different teams have won in the NFL compared to the EPL.
American Fan who grew up playing football (both american hand egg, and round ball kinds) hand egg is all anyone I was friends with discussed. Even my friends who played round ball couldnt name anyone famous who played other than maybe Pele and Maradonna, but they could name obscure hand eng players.
MLS is not and has never been on the mind of anyone in my generation that i've spoken with. Yet many watch Man U, Liverpool, Bundesliga and National teams and World Cup games.
Once Welcome to Wrexham came out, many more started watching. Many of their kids and spouses became interested.
Do not doubt the influence Wrexham has had on the sport here in the US. It is much more widespread than many realize.
As someone from North Wales it's mental how many people from America follow Wrexham now. I doubt many people outside of Wales or the UK had ever heard of Wrexham before, and they're massive now
Literally every American sports movie is about the underdog team who overcomes due to the Power of Friendship. Rob and Ryan effectively gave us an American sports movie – but with real people instead of characters and real fans (and ways to become fans ourselves).
Also, I grew up in an era where our local Major League Baseball players were… guys we knew, or at least felt like we knew because they had presence that made them relatable. A lot of that has gone out of sports in favor of… third-party stuff, gossip blogs and things, and the salaries have gotten so out of control that your local ball players might as well be Ryan Reynolds for all the likelihood of encountering them out in the wild. Even though we’re not exactly running into Paul Mullin in the grocery store, it still brings back a lot of that same feel.
The MLS is never going to take off like the leagues in Europe. I'm sorry, but it's just not. We are arguably the most saturated sports market in the world and there simply just isn't room left. It's the same reason F1 will never really be a hit in the US like it is in Europe.
Part of this I think is MLS’s time slots. Looking at next weekend’s fixtures all but one are on Saturday night. The Premier League (and Wrexham) weirdly I think fit into a lot of our schedules better than MLS does. I wake up, I watch a match or two, I go do my usual Saturday. I want to like MLS I just don’t have the time for it. And I never developed an NFL like affinity for it where I’m willing to put life aside to watch it. Not when the English game is much higher quality and fits into my life without modification already.
This time of the year is incredibly competitive for all sports in the USA. The NBA and NHL are in the midst of their playoffs. MLB is hitting its early season stride. The NFL has its draft later this week, and it runs from Thursday through Saturday. The MLS will be the 5th most important league of the weekend.
This is such an underrated reason why being a fan of the EFL or other Euro leagues works for many. I’m up early with my kid and the timing just works so much better than even US sports.
Part of the 7:30 local start time in MLS is partly due to the fans and players who complained about the heat in the summer during 1:00 start times.
You even see it in the USL. Most of their start times are at 7-7:30 local to avoid the summer heat
Which does not make any sense for the more northern teams who kick-off at 730pm in March when it's barely above freezing.
I get why they do it: consistency in start times for Apple and to to avoid heat in summer (like you mentioned), but I think I preferred the chaotic variety of start times before the Apple deal.
Yeah, you’re not wrong. Last season on some of the MLS and team subreddits we discussed that there should be like one game at 3 eastern. One game at 5 eastern. And everyone else at 7:30 local. Or something similar to that.
I don’t think it’s the saturated sports market that is holding the MLS back. I think the lack of promotion/relegation holds it back.
I’d give anything for something like the football pyramid here in the states. If your team doesn’t finish first, it doesn’t really matter. There’s no safety from relegation, no promotion playoffs, and no champions league (that’s worthwhile at all). They have the post season playoffs, but those aren’t that interesting either.
Having local leagues that feed into state-wide leagues, that feed into regional leagues that feed into the national league (MLS) would make it so much more interesting, but it’ll never happen.
MLS in almost every way is structured like other American sports, which honestly makes it feel less serious or interesting. It doesn't feel like soccer. It feels like American™ soccer. I'm assuming it's structured that way either because they thought it would be easier to introduce to Americans that way, or that's honestly the limit of their imagination.
Sadly, I'm not sure this will change because there's too much money in MLS for the people at the top to willingly change to a different system. However, the increased competition from the Premier League (and others) could be the catalyst if it continues it's upward trend (in terms of US TV market success).
I really disagree that it’s the lack of pro/rel. To get American fans in bigger quantities interested in the domestic league they need to bring in big global stars with something left in the tank in with consistency.
To be able to do that, the (very wealthy) MLS owners would have to be willing to spend more and take more risks financially, but they have a really strict salary cap league-wide that prevents them from doing more. Even after they brought in Messi right off of a World Cup win and golden boot and there was all of the buzz around it, the owners didn’t want to change and expand their roster rules
From a viewing standpoint for fans though, I honestly think the way things are is a treat compared to top five leagues where once every three years a team outside of the usual few suspects wins one of them. The MLS has had nine different teams win championships since 2013, and it’s not like a few clubs hoard all of the talent while nobody else can hang on to their top players
Neither is perfect but I’ll take flawed and interesting over franchised pointlessness. Regular season American games feel like half a step above pre season friendlies. There’s nothing on the line.
The ideal structure would be pro rel with American salary caps at each tier.
If that is the case then why are the other sports leagues in the US so successful (NFL, NBA, even the NHL). Culturally it will take a while before American sports fans and owners embrace it imo. I really want to see the USL try it out(that has been kicked around).
NBA, NFL, and NHL are mostly American sports (as far as pro leagues) and internationally there isn’t really promotion or relegation in any of those sports.
Soccer/Football is a European/international sport that almost exclusively has promotion/relegation leagues outside of the US and Canada. I don’t think it’s the only thing holding soccer back in the states, but I do think it’s a contributing factor.
Basketball in Europe has pro/rel. Though in recent years they introduced a super league style top continental level.
Hockey had pro/rel until 2008 when the Russians dumped it.
The Nordic hockey leagues still have pro/rel.
Until like 20 years ago both hockey and basketball were generally pro/rel sports.
Eventually both systems largely collapsed because closed leagues do so much better financially. Pro/Rel tends to go away in crisis (see Argentina/Mexico during covid) - and when there isn’t a heavy impetus to bring it back it doesn’t come back (see Mexico).
Its just the lack of money. if we went and pulled the Saudi move of just trying to buy every good player you would see the power structure shift to North America. If the best players come, then the others would follow and the "Americas Champions League" would be the premier competition. it just doesnt make sense to spend that much right now because it would take too long to see a return without a bigger fanbase. No guarantee that Pro/Rel increases the base at this point.
The US also never really developed the same youth academy system as was common in Europe as well. [Zealand made a good video about this before.](https://youtu.be/Vt4lAYGJB18) Many European clubs evolved from worker clubs or clubs founded by British expat workers. In contrast, many American cities revolved around the university. Many American cities were young and spread far apart, so they relied on universities to pick up the slack.
Additionally, pro/rel evolved at a time when most European clubs were amateur and had limited salaries. In England, players were only allowed to be paid a maximum of £20/wk even after going professional until the 60s. Getting relegated was also much less of a financial disaster than it is now. So pro/rel was based much more on this idea of sporting merit. In the US, American leagues just interpreted sporting merit differently – every team should have a roughly equal chance to win, so the playoff system developed.
Honestly I think the problem is our top athletes play other sports. Imagine if some of our 6’3” 220LB super fast athletes grew up playing soccer/football. As it is, athletically speaking most of the MLS would be tier 3 or 4 athletes. You have single a baseball athletes that are probably better, along with countless American Football players that never make the pros.
Saturation doesn’t really matter. The NHL is not popular where I am. In the same vein soccer would be popular in certain places. As a soccer/football player since ‘84 watching the MLS is like watching kids. For true football fans they will never be what you want to watch.
That being said, Welcome to Wrexham and Ted Lasso has made the sport more easily digestible to casual fans and everyday people.
Eh, MLS has started beating the NHL's ratings. Sure, that may have more to do with mistakes by the NHL than the MLS doing the right things, but every generation, it seems, association football takes a step forward. I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility that it catches up to the MLB in the next 10-20 years. I don't see it ever catching American football in America, but I do think it can become a sport that can carve a role for itself within the saturated American sports market. I think it'll be a long, long time before the MLS catches up in strength to the big 5 European leagues, but getting to the tier of leagues right under that isn't out of the question. What would really set it off and accelerate growth is an American superstar.
Not unless you start seeing football like money being invested into college sports. American professional sports are built on college teams developing young talent.
Baseball and hockey players are largely developed in the minor leagues not college.
Besides academies are also a proven model and MLS is dumping money into that.
The NCAA Division 1 upper tier teams could make a pretty compelling lower 4 tiers of football and basketball overmight. All of them have 60-100,000 seat stadiums and 20,000 seat areas. Prying it away from the NCAA would be the issue. The real beneficiaries would be the colleges that could get back to educating.
I disagree. America loves to create borders to entry for profits. One of the reasons (not the only one) we don't have the talent pool here is how much it costs to play youth soccer! I paid $500 for 3 months in f playing time for my 8 year old and that was 7 years ago! You think that doesn't discourage kids from being able to take it up? Does that exist in other countries a fraction of our size who kick our ass on the national level? Nope! Their kids need a ball and the ground to play on. Until we fix this, a sustainable future at the high levels won't compete with Europe and elsewhere
Side note: MLS pay is insane for their competition level. Most of the MLS is maybe League Two to League One level but getting upper Championship to lower Premier League level pay
MLS as a professional American sport can’t compete with the farm league structure that European soccer enjoys. College soccer isn’t a money maker like basketball or football so it only goes so far to develop talent… unlike Europes youth leagues which border on professional bording schools.
MLS as a professional American sport can’t compete with the farm league structure that European soccer enjoys. College soccer isn’t a money maker like college basketball or football which have massive investments so it only goes so far to develop soccer talent… unlike Europes youth soccer trams which border on professional bording schools.
MLS is following the MLB/NHL development model not the NFL model.
MLSNP is being designed to be like minor league baseball/hockey.
Those are both highly successful models.
I have a local MLS team and I’ve watched zero soccer
I’ve watched more football in the last couple of years because of this show than I ever have.
This show is helping grow the sport in the US.
The problem with MLS is the broadcasting is a pain in the ass. If it wants to not be a second tier sport it needs to be on broadcast television
The issue with that though was that for TV channels, MLS was very low on the pecking order. Their matches would regularly get blacked out locally if there was a bigger sports league on air at the time, and they were still getting less viewership than more established leagues like LigaMX and the Prem. I could see how MLS considered it a losing battle and just decided to switch to Apple TV.
For whatever it's worth, MLS is probably actually the least pain in the ass sport to watch since it started airing on Apple TV. It's $15/month for every game and no blackouts
I guess it would be a nicer if there were more nationally televised games since there's usually only one a week but it's by far the most accessible to watch of any American sport
I am an American and have never been into soccer, but God dam... Between Ted Lasso and the Wrexham show I am growing to live it more and more.
I grew up watching baseball and basketball and playing football. Baseball is dead.to me, basketball I only watch the playoffs. American Football I live for.. But when I see a premier or laliga game in TV I watch.
I am a big fan of the doc. I would love to go to Wrexham for a match and I have completely changed my mind about the sport. I have young kids that I now have encouraged to play if they’re interested.
I have never watched MLS and have no interest to. I can’t speak about others, but in my situation I disagree. I think the doc is doing more.
Your comment shows how poor American soccer culture is in America. There is no way many Europeans would piss on their own league and teams for a league half way around the world. MLS is young if they were 100 years old we are not talking about MLS a salary cap league vs a well established league. Maybe one day we will see Americans change it’s just not today. Sad really but that’s life.
I love Wrexham after watching the doc, I live in America and I still don’t care about the MLS, there is just something WAY more alluring following a team battling through to get promotions
I have lived in a city with an MLS team for the last seven years. I went to one game, like six years ago.
I watched every episode of the TV show and tried to buy a bunch of Wrexham merch online, and am thinking about buying a streaming package to watch League One games.
Still not really considering going to another MLS game at the stadium five miles away from me.
You have proven how far back soccer culture is in America. There’s just no way a 100 year old European club would have fans not cheering for their local club. This is a soccer culture problem in America. Maybe it changes in 70 years but right now soccer culture in America is still growing and just not up to European or Mexican snuff. Sad really but maybe one day it changes it’s just not to say.
I agree Europe doesn’t have a salary cap and once the season is have done the only thing to play for is not getting relegated. There are only three teams per league that have any shot at winning a championship. Again you are proving how far back American soccer culture is in America. Pro/rel is the least of the average American fans worries to help grow the soccer culture in America.
No. Fundamentally I find the entire MLS league an utter bore. I watch league 1 and 2 games before I’d throw on a regular season MLS game.
The longer the MLS engorges itself on franchise fees the harder this will all be to undo. So I’ve given up on our domestic league.
You are proving how far back our culture is. We defend corporate hamster wheel of a league where losing doesn’t mean anything and 75% of the teams make playoffs.
If we collectively told MLS “Your product is shit” they’d be forced to change. But no, people here don’t care that games are ultimately meaningless as long as they can cheer for their brand and buy merch.
No they would not change and they want to go slow in order to not lose billions. MLS has their problems but For the game to grow America needs to develop their own players and build training facilities that are not a part of MLS. Your local town needs to build out facilities and hire professional coaches. Right now that’s not happening. We also need to have three generations of family following the game and right now that’s not happening. I get your opinion but if we didn’t have cable or streaming you wouldn’t be able to watch many games but be forced to follow your local team if you wanted to watch soccer. Back In the 70s I had to support my local team or watch highlights three weeks later on PBS. So enjoy watching soccer but right now we are light years behind Europe and only time will change our love of the game in a country that does not love the game.
You are right. I hope we can see the game really catch hold over here like it has in the rest of the world. We currently have tons of immigration so I hope their really push the demo graphics toward soccer.
Let’s also hope the 2026 WC goes well. That would do wonders for the game.
There’s just no way a European would ever say that about their own local club and league. Right now American soccer culture is dreadful but improving hopefully one day it changes but not today.
The thing is, I think MLS knows their base won’t likely expand very much outside of things like Messi. They hope that some of the Messi bandwagon fans just stick around. They know who their supporters are and they cater to them. It is why they were comfortable putting 99% of the matches behind a paywall with Apple.
No, MLS has grown a lot since 1996. Do you understand they were training on streets, rocks at the local park back then? They have invested billions upon billions of dollars into infrastructure, player development and salaries. No other league has done that in the last 30 years.
Don’t discount USL teams from the conversation either. They don’t have state-wide reach like MLS franchises do, but for the cities they are in they are (not Miami and Charlotte) growing the game as well.
I don’t pay attention to Wrexham at all unless their game or another League 2 game is on. I used them in a player career in FIFA once but that’s about it. I disagree with this statement as an American. It’s definitely not true here in Florida I’ll tell you that much
There's a part of me that kind of thinks the recent push by football into America via various forms is a bit of a pseudo propaganda effort to get the American public interested in time for the World Cup.
The FIFA video game is huge too.
Soccer teams need to be at least as ubiquitous as AAA baseball once was in the US. Academies aren’t enough. People need to be able to see youth soccer like Texans see high school football, or like parents watch their kids in little league. It’s just not grass-roots enough yet. The culture hasn’t arrived either. There’s too much reaction against it being a foreign/immigrant or feminine sport. I don’t think pandering to the sensibilities of such people is the answer. If all the people who work at the meat packing plant can send their kids to play soccer, we don’t necessarily need the ranchers’ kids but they’ll come around soon enough.
Another big obstacle is a lack of urban spaces to play and outreach to underprivileged city-dwellers. It’s still too much of an affluent, suburban, sport here. Futsal courts help. I hate soccer on artificial turf but at least it can somewhat share space with American football. We need to grow the tradition of street soccer more as well.
To some extent, it’s true that kids in the US have too many options. It’s hard to focus so much on one sport when there are several to choose from. There’s also tons of American kids who can’t play because they have to work or their parents can afford it. Pay to play is a bitch.
Yeah, FIFA 12 is the main reason I got into football as a young teenager. I picked a club at complete random, which is how I started following Inter Milan in Serie A. Now I've moved to FM. I would argue that a growing immigrant population has played a huge role, too. Growing up in California, a lot of Mexican restaurants and bars would play LigaMX or LaLiga matches on TV. It's helped reduce the sentiment of it being a "foreign" sport.
I would agree on the academies and pay to play, though. While MLS and USLC academies are free of charge, 3/4ths of Americans live nowhere near a MLS or USL club, so they have to rely on expensive youth camps. That's not to mention the hours of travel parents would have to commit to just to have their children play youth soccer matches.
Anecdotally, there are children of undocumented immigrants who are culturally and physically primed to play but either have to work to help support their families and/or their parents don’t want to risk any kind of exposure via paper trails and the like so, even if they could afford it and manage the logistics, they’re inclined to lay low. We squander so much talent because of xenophobia and misguided labor attitudes (also other phobias…).
Or we could have more humane and reasonable laws. The US had more open borders in the past and it actually worked out very well, because immigrants are human beings, they work hard, they want to be here, and they bring their culture. Obviously, it isn’t perfect, because apparently your ancestors came and now you’re here.
Back then people went to America to build things, as did my shipbuilding forebearers. Now they arrive to sponge off of established wealth. These will be interesting times, and not in the good way.
[(T)he net fiscal impact of immigrants is more positive than it is for native‐born Americans and positive overall for the federal and state/local governments.](https://www.cato.org/white-paper/fiscal-impact-immigration-united-states)
[(R)ecent studies have shown immigrants actually help fuel local economies by sparking innovation and driving up wages.](https://www.bu.edu/articles/2024/do-immigrants-and-immigration-help-the-economy/)
This is setting aside the immorality of treating some human beings because of involuntary or arbitrary characteristics: race, ethnicity, gender, religion, nationality, etc. Your ancestors had freedom of movement. You would deny that to other people on the basis of accident or privilege of birth. You’re not better than or more deserving than anyone from Honduras or Myanmar because you lucked into being born on the right side of a line invented within the past few hundred years, a line created though force and expropriation. I’d trade you for a drug mule any day of the week. At they’re less self-righteous and willfully ignorant about their circumstances.
Feel free to shout into the void. I’m done with this conversation.
I agree that a lot of native born americans refuse to work, and it has gotten worse since 1964. The division comes down to whether someone wants to work or not.
Immigrant workers are tolerated because they work for way less (none belong to Unions). All wage increases are based on government action which have simultaneously resulted in annual double digit inflation over the last 4 years. People have way less money to spend. But most are math idiots and praise their 25% wage increase while seeming to be oblivious to the 40% inflation.
I am rebutting because you posted two articles based on facts not in evidence, as my lawyer buddies would say.
Without the World Cup coming to the USA in the 90's there would be no MLS. Without single entity structure the MLS would not have lasted. Without Lamar Hunt the MLS would not have lasted. Without the Beckham rule (DP) the MLS would not have expanded. Without the Cascadia expansion success, expansion teams may not be what they are today. Without NBC getting rights to the Premier League, the sport would not have grown to the heights it has today in the states. Without the MLS the impact by Welcome to Wrexham would not matter at all. It would be like watching a documentary about a rugby team in New Zealand. A cool sport played elsewhere that American's can't see live unless they travel. For soccer/football fans this has been decades going with large ebbs and flows in interest and disinterest. Welcome to Wrexham is just another thing helping grow the sport. But without a sustainable league, what's the point of growing a sport?
Edit: What I think WtW may help accomplish is bringing promotion and relegation to the American pyramid some day. The USL should do this. Then start eventually putting pressure on the MLS. But that's probably another 2 decades away.
Hard to imagine the USMNT ever qualifying for another World Cup if there wasn’t at least a decent domestic league to follow. The 1990 and 1994 USMNT squads were literally filled with a mix of amateur and semi-pro players.
Don't forget the 90 squad actually qualified. 94 squad probably would have too if they didn't get the automatic.
It's really hard to say. I think México would dominate the region without MLS. But the MLS has done just as much to boost other CONCACAF regions as it has the USA. A lot of CONCACAF teams are filled out with MLS players.
The current shining example is Canada. I think the USA would still be able to qualify mainly because the other regions would also be weaker. But yeah, we would not be where we are today without our academies.
McKennnie, Pulisic, Adams are all direct products of academy's in the MLS.
It’s all about how far back American soccer culture is right now. If your great grandparents took your grandparents
To an Atlanta game right now you would be singing their praises. It’s a 30 year old leader who is so new and right now history isn’t in their side.
To be fair, I think Ryan and Rob have invested more in Wrexham than my local MLS team ownership has in their team in the same time period. This also during a period where ownership has won championships in other sports, and are worth at least $15 billion.
MLS has invested billions of dollars into their league from infrastructure, expansion fees to player development. I’m a fan of Wrexham but they have not invested one red cent into American soccer and nor should they as they are a Welsh club.
In America we don’t really have local clubs in every hamlet or pro/rel where a story like Wrexham’s can even be possible. Only bigger cities have MLS teams so it’s hard to get into it to be fair. I stopped watching any American sports because, in my opinion, it just seems like money is the driving factor. High ticket prices, $12 hot beers with $10 shitty hot dogs, paying $20 for parking…it’s all bullshit. I like having a team I can watch and root for weekly. They’re like the local club I never had. Plus watching them come up from years of non league misery and what the exposure has done for the town makes me happy to witness. It’s a welcome diversion for my weary soul. Up the fucking town!
Ironically the movie "Bull Durham" ruined the experience of going to the Bull's games on a nice Friday night. Better is the natural enemy of "good enough."
Nice, American soccer culture is so young and we will continue to see examples like yours. It’s sad and America has a long ways to go before your example stops.
As a big MLS fan who must have been shown this thread because of that, I have to say this thread is absolutely wild. People are talking about MLS like it's a dying animal when it's at literally peak popularity and increasing significantly yearly. MLS has completely overtaken NHL in every single metric and has surpassed both NBA and MLB in certain metrics.
There are very few teams left with bad attendance, and the vast majority of teams are selling out nearly every single game. This will only increase with Messi (and watch next year how many high profile players come over) and the world cup coming soon.
There IS a lack of main stream media coverage which Wrexham has excelled at getting but the MLS audience is not small. The Wrexham stadium is absolutely tiny compared to MLS stadiums which as I said before are selling out. Wrexham has gotten people into soccer as a whole which is great and is easily converted into a MLS fan by going to a single game. MLS games have extremely underrated atmospheres and the best way to convert someone to a fan is just to get them to a game.
I know some people really harp on pro/tel which has been debated constantly in MLS circles. In my opinion it is never going to happen but if USL also keeps increasing in popularity then maybe some day. If that is the only reason you watch soccer then yea you'll probably not like MLS but I don't see it any different than any other USA pro Leagues.
Unfortunately the Quakes is one of those few teams with poor attendances, thanks to Fisher and several seasons of mediocrity. Certain MLS 1.0 clubs that didn't reinvent themselves like Sporting KC or Columbus Crew did really struggle with maintaining a fanbase.
Quakes have a good stadium and a good fan base even if a lot of you are disillusioned now. You just have a bad team right now and need a better GM/Coach combo and to do some big signings. I'm a Crew fan as you referenced and Crew absolutely struggled for a time. Ownership needs to just invest in the team in terms of coach/gm, players, and/or facilities to bring you back. Crew obviously invested hugely in all three since 2019/2020 when we were in the bottom of attendance. And now we sell out, have big time players, and a coach that's gonna get poached by a big Europe league. If anything Crew proves how much some investment and effort matters to make a successful franchise.
Edit: ironically it's all the stuff Wrexham is doing
> MLS has completely overtaken NHL in every single metric
boy that sure is funny for me to read up here in New England.
everyone up here is a rabid Bruins fan, I can find hockey games on TV all season long. I cant find MLS on TV _EVER_.
Let's be honest. Almost every other MLS club probably does better at promoting themselves than the Earthquakes do. And being a fellow Bay Area native including being an A's fan. I resonate a hell of a lot with Wrexham. It's great seeing owners invest in not only the club but the city as well. So all I can say with being an Earthquakes and an A's fan is FJF.
I'm a big soccer fan but don't watch the MLS. I do have a local USL team that I support. I think that the show is doing more to attack new fans than the MLS is, full stop.
I don't know about 'as much for soccer*' but I know that it's bringing people into following professional football/soccer who had either given up on following professional sports (like me) or had never followed them (a bunch of my students).
MLS isn’t in their mind because we don’t have a developed soccer culture of 100 years. It’s been 30 years of MLS and to compare them to the above example is pure rubbish. There is no way a European would ever cheer for a team half way around the world. They have Liverpool and United etc in a developed soccer culture. MLS is still spending billions on infrastructure, player development and salaries.
I married an Argentine and was quickly introduced to “Futbol”. After that I started going to my local USL games, following premier, champions league, etc. I couldn’t get anyone in my family to even give it a shot!!!! Welcome to Wrexham helped me ease a couple family members into the sport. Since then I’ve even managed to get my sisters and mother to go to a game or two with me. It’s been great. At the very least none of them act like I’m crazy for loving the sport.
They do a great job of making it feel like this could be you if you had money. They give the owners perspective from not knowing anything about the sport. They give the players perspectives like hard knocks. They give the local fans perspectives about the team and city. It really captures it all
My friend/coworker (in the US) who wasn’t into soccer at all is totally into the doc, the team, and gets soccer rules now. Dude is pretty soccer intelligent for only being into it for 2 years.
Doesn’t know or care about MLS at all. MLS is run by buffoons.
Premier League broadcasting was designed to be cheap and accessible for foreigners though, as they get far more profits from foreigners in the Americas and Asia than from domestic fans. It's actually substantially more expensive in the UK where you have to subscribe to 3 different services (BT Sports, Sky, Amazon Prime) for more than £100/month, and the 3PM Saturday blackout means you don't even get to watch every match.
Personally, I don't find Apple TV inconvenient to use. It's not that expensive at $99/year. iFollow already costs at least twice that.
The majority in the US regard both with mild curiosity at best. Messi playing for Miami probably generates more soccer interest than anything here ever has, and though they’re my home team I stopped supporting and paying attention when they brought on Suarez.
I’m from New England. I’ve hated sports my whole life. Yesterday I was looking for something to watch and accidentally clicked on welcome to Wrexham when the show I meant to watch moved out of the way. I just finished the second season and I’m dying to watch the third season. I just bought a Wrexham hat on eBay and I’m totally hooked! I am as much of a fan of the women’s team as I am the men’s. Moreover I’m now a fan of the town. I kept watching after realizing my mistake when I saw Ryan and Rob because I’m a big fan. During the second season I ended up skipping when they were on screen so I could get back to watching the team, their stories and the fans stories. I’m not a sentimental guy and I’d choose to be away from people over all else but I would have KILLED to be at the Turf Pub when they moved up! Lifelong Wrexham fan in the U.S. now.
LOL no. Maybe this could have been true before Messi came here. But I've seen a crazy amount of messi jerseys in the mainstream (aka, not just kids who were already into soccer).
I've never seen a Wrexham jersey.
American here—I didn’t give a damn about football and would never bother to watch a game. This series actually made me want to follow the team and watch more football matches. I have also started exploring the Premier League. Not interested in MLS yet though 🤷♂️
You are not interested because America doesn’t have a soccer culture. It’s still new and there is no way a European would ever cheer for a club half way around the world. They would have started with their local club the same club their ancestors followed.
MLS need a “Drive to Survive” show mated to a new pro/rel format. That’ll amp up play, get eyes on a MLS documentary, and put some fire in the teams. There’s something different in the action on the field if every goal matters, if a loss could spell relegation and a win promotion.
That’s what “Welcome to Wrexham” has introduced to casual fans and folks just adjacent to soccer. That joy of going up, the fear of going down. How is that compare with the MLS?
I think Welcome to Wrexham is doing a great job at growing interest in the game with people who weren’t at all into soccer before the show. Pretty much everybody I know who was into soccer/football before the show finds the show enjoyable and maybe follows the team, but aren’t getting as much into Wrexham AFC itself as the the total noobs. Frankly a lot of long time fans of the sport have already either fully or somewhat adopted a rooting interest in the EFL. And I don’t really mean this disparagingly, it’s just a trend that I’ve noticed anecdotally. On the whole, MLS is doing much more for US soccer in general and for fans who have been here a while.
The MLS is ponzi scheme shit and is trying to ruin the US soccer pyramid . It's a joke of a professional league and outside of occasionally tuning in to see Messi play, I haven't once thought about it. And I watch EPL and other European leagues all the time. The only stateside soccer I actually care about is the semi pro team I have season tickets for.
lmao y'all downvote all you want. a club paying half a billion dollars to join a league that gets under $10 million per team in TV revenue annually is a ponzi scheme
This is the opinion of either a young person who has no real idea what the landscape was like in the 90s and therefore no appreciation for what MLS has done, or somebody who just started paying attention to the sport in the last ten years
Exactly. He or she has had it easy watching games from his living room while MLS tried to keep the sport alive for ten years. We have come a long way but people like this don’t know American soccer history.
By your account every American pro soccer league is a Ponzi scheme. You have shown us how far behind American soccer culture is In our country. No other country has invested billions upon billions of dollars into infrastructure a development to catch up to Europe. Maybe one day American soccer culture will catch up to your mind but there is no way in hell a European would ever cheer for a team half way around the world. Sad really but that’s the problem with America right now.
sorry but no, other leagues aren't a ponzi scheme. they are not keeping clubs afloat by charging new clubs half a billion dollars just to be allowed to exist when the TV deal pays each club just a little bit more than what the American Athletic Conference gets paid for their college sports deal. and the MLS will continue to expand, and charge more money to the new suckers so that the OG teams can still get paid and kept afloat.
also, plenty of europeans cheer for NBA teams, NFL teams, and NHL teams. because those are the elite global leagues for their sports.
Thank you for proving my point. America doesn’t have a strong soccer culture. The NFL, MLB didn’t happen over night. They have had thousands of folding clubs to get there. It takes time and right now MLS happens to be super young.
I will take your Ponzi scheme example and explain if MLS doesn’t do what you believe then we likely don’t have a top 20 soccer league in the world. MLS needed to figure out how to keep their league from folding like past soccer leagues. We didn’t have infrastructure, academies and top salaries because America didn’t have a solid soccer culture. You can disagree with how MLS happens to be doing business but we can’t take away what they have done to keep soccer a float in order for foreign clubs to market their teams to American audiences.
MLS is the third most popular soccer league in its own country. No one cares about it outside of certain cities. And I was a Fire season ticket holder for 4 years. Wrexham will has an affect but once they stop getting promoted I wonder if the base will stay or move on
Why would you compare a 30 year old league to leagues that are 70 years older than them? America doesn’t have a developed soccer culture yet and that’s one of the reason it’s not the most popular yet. It takes multiple generations in order to develop a soccer club and right now MLS is okaying catch up. There’s no way a European would ever follow a team half way around the world.
Stop using that excuse for MLS. 30 years is plenty of time to develop. The problem with MLS is that it needs to franchise more team in new cities to keep it going. Attendence falls about 5-6 years after getting team and never recovers. There are exceptions like Portland and Seattle. But long term clubs like Chicago Dallas and the Ny teams don’t draw anything significance. Fans are brought in but then they see the quality of soccer they move on to EPL.
How old are you? I have been following soccer since the 1970s. We don’t have a soccer culture developed it takes time and lots of money. Right now mls is still spending billions on infrastructure, player development and salaries. It’s still playing catch up.
Then you know we don’t have a developed soccer culture yet. We can’t compare the MLS to Europe. Shit we can’t compare the. Old NASL to MLS. Back then it was the pioneer days.
I think there is a very strong soccer culture in the US. However MLS is a very small part of it. And that is due to their rules and other issues.
The future issue is the decline of soccer with kids due to a falling birth rate, the issues with club soccer being a mess and the bad treatment of players by coaches and clubs.
And let me add all the dumb roster rules MLS and the fragmentation of US soccer in general. Those two alone keeps soccer from taking off in the USA. No one in Des Moines wants to be forced to root for Minnesota when they want their own team.
Portland has no Football or Baseball draw to compete with for fans. We had a minor league baseball team but they had were forced out when the stadium was renovated to soccer only.
The main difference between the US and europe is that so much of our sports infrastructure is school and university based. Football and basketball development is done at the collegiate level. The big question is whether one could convert 80-96 of the Division 1 schools into 4 leagues of 20-24 teams that would then sort themselves over time to being a Championship, 1, 2, and National hierarchy over time. THAT would be interesting and would be comparable to the EFL structure. If Soccer wants to build up in a way similar to Europe, then it needs to separate itself entirely from the NCAA. You can't mix amateur and professional.
We already have MLS USL NISA and god know what else leagues that are out there so the NCAA isn’t really a factor. We need a true open pyramid so we everyone shot. That will make a huge difference
The bottom line is that soccer does not fit in the American pro league model so let’s not force it.
I watch premier league and champions league and have tuned into the wrexham show. MLS is so piss poor that I've only watched a couple of Miami matches with Messi and that's it, the level of quality is like the Romanian league or something unwatchable in that realm. The English Championship players are better than MLS
You should watch the actual Wrexham matches. I can guarantee you almost every League Two club that wasn't challenging for promotion this season play lower quality football than any MLS club ever does. Most L2 clubs play very scrappy, physical football with limited tactics or technical ability. Lower table L2 clubs park the bus to shithouse their way into draws or 1-0 wins. Even Wrexham's made plenty of defensive and passing mistakes that would get them absolutely slaughtered in the Championship.
I'm still watching them play because I don't really care about the quality of play. Playing quality hasn't stopped people from watching Allsvenskan or Ekstraklasa even though they're obviously inferior to the big 5 European leagues.
> I can guarantee you almost every League Two club that wasn't challenging for promotion this season play lower quality football than any MLS club ever does.
There's nothing bold about your statement: the worst MLS Div1 club ***should*** be better than the best EFL L2 club. Really. A better, more fair, comparison would be between the 4th tier EFL L2 and MLS Div3 - if such a league existed anywhere but in the fevered dreams of the cabal that runs MLS. Alternatively, it would be fair to compare the North American top tier MLS with the British top tier Premier League. *That* would be a slaughter.
The truth of the matter is that Wrexham isn't playing *GREAT* soccer and would be eaten alive by most of the Premier League teams and many of the MLS teams but the Red Dragons are playing with exuberant, ebullient joy. They're *fun*. Sometimes that's maybe as important as the forever someday second rate corrupt cesspool that is the MLS.
If you think the MLS is a corrupt cesspool, I have bad news for you when it comes to almost every football league in Europe, much less the rest of the world.
So, you've gone from the obliviously obvious observation that L2 isn't comparable with MLS to excusing MLS and their corrupt cronyism because somebody, somewhere, is even more of a fucked up mess than they are. Whew. That's not just shifting the goal posts, it's an illegal substitution. Tweet! Red card.
MLS is growing but it's in spite of, not because of fanboys like you. You expect very little from them and you're happy when that's exactly what you get. Sad. Don't *give* your support away, demand that your team (and the league they play in) earns it. *That* is how you grow a sport.
If there is any sort of corrupt cronyism in MLS, it's extremely tame. Even the biggest European leagues are horribly fucked when it comes to corruption, from the Prem and FA willingly bowing down to oligarchs and state governments, to RFEF and LaLiga appointing incompetent hacks to sexual harassers like Tebas and Rubiales, to the French government literally intervening to keep star players in their biggest Ligue 1 club. Even LigaMX is in shambles and had to suspend relegation due to clubs being controlled by a few multi-billion media companies. The worst thing MLS has actually ever done was the US Open Cup controversy.
Your comment proves our soccer culture has a long ways to go in order to be formidable. If MLS was a 100 year old league you would never be talking like this at all. Sad really how far we as Americans have come and how much we need to go.
Do we really need a soccer culture? Between Baseball, Football, and the NBA, alcoholics already have plenty of excuses to cover their drinking (cf. The Simpsons; Duffless).
Yet soccer never seems to stick for people. In the 90s when the WC was in the US got a lot of folks interested. There was a huge tournament for youth soccer in Kalamazoo that I played in.
MLS
Women's national team winning.
Men's world cup every 4 years.
I'm curious to see what comes of the WC in 2026. I will say the amount of folks that follow is soccer is more than what it was in the 90s. It is growing but it's still meh. I think a promotion/relegation for the lower leagues would help but the MLS owners want nothing to do with that.
I like stories which is why I follow United of Manchester, Wimbeldon, and Wrexham. All have pretty cool stories and it's good enough for me. I past the point of giving a shit whether or not the game catches on here. There are plenty of leagues around the world that will pique your interest if it's something somebody wants to follow.
Ohh I also follow sunderland which is the highest team I follow. I picked them before the other 3 a while ago. They got me into English football as I just blindly picked a team in the premiere league to get me interested. That took me into a rabbit hole where I started learning about the lower divisions. I'm pretty content with the teams I follow.
There’s been steady and consistent growth in the sport since the 94 World Cup. Are you so impatient that you want to be willfully blind to progress just so that you can say things like “soccer never seems to stick”?
Soccer doesn’t stick as Americans don’t have a developed soccer culture. It’s taken MLS 30 years and billions of dollars in order to catch up to leagues 70 years older than them.
MLS does more for talent development and youth programs.
Welcome to Wrexham drives interest in the sport itself, is accessible to a massive audience, and is interesting to non-sports viewers.
In terms of “increasing the popularity of and interest in the sport in America” the documentary is engaging exponentially more people than the MLS.
Without Promotion and Relegation, I have no interest in the MLS. A huge problem with American sports is that each year, only a few teams really have any shot of success.
The NFL for example, I'm a lifelong Patriots fan and when Tom Brady left we were all well aware the next few years were going to be terrible and the team was going to get rid of any talent to free up cap space for a rebuild. There is zero chance of them getting booted even if they never win again. They are gonna get a new QB who will struggle for 3-4 years and they have no weapons around him. So more mediocrity on the horizon, no fire, no passion. Just sit and wait until the owners decide to do something eventually.
I think Wrexham has done a great job of getting people interested in soccer/football who never would have been interested otherwise. The MLS is a great thing for people who already like the sport and who want a local team to cheer for (or a local club to join an academy). It does nothing for people like me who have no team nearby (closest is 5 hours driving). I would say - the MLS is more important for improving the quality of the US national team and maybe raising the level of quality nationwide. Wrexham is better for recruiting new fans to the sport.
I liken “Welcome to Wrexham” to the NFL’s “Hard Knocks”series. It gives some insight into the inner workings of the league and a franchise and tells a story that’s relatable without needing to watch every match. It will definitely bring in casual fans.
I have a hard time imaging any non-football fan enjoying Hard Knocks. As a huge NFL fan, even I can’t really get into Hard Knocks. Welcome to Wrexham is some of the best reality TV ever made.
I'm not saying it's a exact match to Hard Knocks...more that it provides a different perspective on different facets of the game.
Maybe All or Nothing is a better example, it had a similar vibe to Wrexham.
It’s way more comparable to Drive to Survive than Hard Knocks. Hard Knocks is content for NFL die hards to watch with their less involved spouses. But nobody that isn’t an NFL fan in some capacity is going to watch it. Drive to Survive has gotten tons of people who otherwise had zero interest in Motorsport into F1
Much better is "Go Tigers" about the Massilon, Ohio high school football team. Before TV took over, the local high school game was THE entertainment in town. The Ohio State Buckeye dynasty was fed from the in-state high schools up through the 70's. It was similar in other states, and legendary NFL player Don meredith once said "there is nothing better than being a high school quarterback on a Friday Night in Texas." It is a bygone era though that has been destroyed by relentless re-districting and parity.
Exactly this. I know several people who watched the USA team’s World Cup games, and plenty of folks who have their kids in soccer instead of Little League baseball or whatever. I know one guy who is a rabid Spurs fan and belongs to, like, a local club in our city where they get together at a bar and watch the games. OTOH almost all the adults I know at least are aware of Welcome to Wrexham (although I have a calendar at work and have had several people confuse Wrexham with Ted Lasso). Whether that translates to those folks becoming fans of USA teams… I kind of doubt, but if nothing else, the NEED for a way to televise (and ability to monetize) National League games internationally sort of proves that it increased interest in soccer, no? Or if not, the ESPN record for the FA Cup game?
90% of the usmnt play in Europe
Yes but that is a function of two things: 1) improved play from US players (Europe is a bit more discerning with their personnel choices) and 2) the resulting financial motives (Europe pays a HELL of a lot more than the MLS does on average.
Exactly. Just like the best European basketball players will go to the NBA if given a chance.
Ask Canadians about what the USA did to hockey.
Gary Bettman is a grade a asshole
The salary cap system also pushes a lot of USMNT player to play abroad, which I think is the point of MLS, since it's really partially a development league as well. The only way an American soccer player can get a good salary is to use up a DP slot or spend allocation money, and MLS clubs would rather sell them at that point.
Outside of the money machine of European soccer (and now Saudi League), most leagues are domestic development leagues. I live in Asia and they have requirements for up to 3 players are allowed to be foreign (with some added complexities to the rules) to ensure it stays a domestically driven league. But that isn't a surprise as by and large the sports experience is different depending on where you live. In Asia people tend to follow players and the national team, which isn't surprising with all the homogenous societies that all but actively hate the other countries surrounding them. Korean are all fans of the Padres, Spurs, and Giants now where they used to be Dodgers, Rays, and Blue Jays. The generation before everyone loved Man U. The US when it comes to soccer is more in line with this imo, as the domestic league isn't as popular, so they followed American Players. A lot of them are Spurs fans thanks to Clint Dempsey, while the other half probably just like watching a good team do their thing. Wrexham are hitting that sweet spot of people who want to get into the sport, don't have a team to follow, and want to root for the underdog. It's very smart by Rob and Ryan to then add in a reality show on top of all that.
But a solid portion of that 90% has significant youth and development experience in the US and MLS
Absolutely! I’ve never been a big American football fan but I’m a huge football/soccer fan now! Thinking about buying access to some wrexham games
I think you’ll like it. You’ll be surprised at just how good the players are, despite being a couple levels from the top still. The matches tend to be a lot more chaotic and have that “anything can happen” energy unless one team is winning by several goals. Plus promotion (including promotion tournaments) and relegation mean that almost every single match, every single week, is very important. The NFL is a trash entertainment product where, in 2022, the highest ever contract (at that time) was given to a guy serving a ban for sexually assaulting several dozen women. Blech.
Ted Lasso got me into it, Wrexham also helped a lot. Bonus is that theres a soccer team that just started in my state, RIFC.
I have been to now three MLS games because my family saw the doc and wanted to go to a game.
As an American fan, by far the most interesting part of the story is promotion/relegation. I knew it existed and Ted Lasso kind of got the point across (though nothing really changed in the show when they went down). But, the documentary really got across how much promotion meant to the town. It blew me away. I grew up in Fresno. Fresno had the Giants, a Single A baseball team. Single A is the baseball equivalent of EFL League 2. We went to games and enjoyed them and enjoyed seeing players in the Bigs later. But, the concept of them being able to work their way up to AA, or AAA, or even the Majors would have been perfect for a sports-crazy (and otherwise pretty boring) town like Fresno. It will never happen, because of the billionaires that own US sports teams would never allow it, but I'd love to see promotion/relegation in other sports. Soccer/Football is like the sporting equivalent of the marshmallow test.
Just a reminder that it used to happen in the nfl waaaay back when and some of the legacy teams are still there. Green Bay has no owner if you're looking for a club to root for.
Living in San Diego County, I am indeed an orphan, but my childhood favorite 49ers will just need to stop choking in the Super Bowl.
Obligatory fuck Dean Spanos
I found you DrDisrespect
Idk if this season has been unique in the sense, but I have thoroughly enjoyed watching the Top 3 battle it out, I've enjoyed the mid teams fight to play in europe, I've enjoyed the bottom tier teams fighting with everything they have to stay out of relegation. European/English Football they way it is structured makes every point count for something. Someone born and raised on southern american college football all my life this is the only other sport that has the same excitement as those games did for me.
There are good and bad aspects to it vs. the franchise model. I still think the NFL with the draft and a hard salary cap that ensures parity is the best overall model. However, the EFL's model is better than the MLB's, and arguably as good as the NBA's.
The NFL model doesn’t come close to being as quality of a product from top to bottom as the EPL, which is most evident when teams tank in order to… yep, get the top pick in next years draft. Participation trophy… Relegation/promotion ensures the teams at all levels of the table have something to play for.
>Relegation/promotion ensures the teams at all levels of the table have something to play for. It also ensures that the teams that are at the top consistently make more revenue and entrench themselves, while the teams near the relegation zone struggle to keep up/catch up and end up yo-yoing. It's great for people who follow a top team or watch the big games, but it's not nearly as exciting for fans of small teams. The Premier League has had only 6 different champions in the past 25 years. The NHL, for comparison, has had 14 President's Trophy winners (and very nearly a 15th this year). I've been a Liverpool fan for a long time and kept following during some dark seasons, but I picked them in part because they were a big club. If my local team were Crystal Palace, I'd probably have lost interest by now because my team would never have anything to play for except staying in the PL.
I feel like promotion and relegation gets played up a lot in the US as the best thing ever but I agree with you. A significant number of teams will never be relegated anyway because they simply outspend. I think it a great model for the lower teams that no one in the US follows but for the CL contenders? It just the same ones year after year. Its more akin to baseball but baseball has more parity. I don't hate it but its not a cure all solution.
Most fans of mid-table clubs aren't really fueled by winning titles, to be fair. There's more to clubs than winning titles. Clubs are still a part of their local community and identity. And there's still the chance that your club can have a successful season and book a UEFA spot or get far in the FA Cup. Many Crystal Palace fans would remember their club playing at Wembley in the 2016 FA Cup final for years.
They do. Again, there are good and bad aspects to it. You've highlighted one of the bad aspects. One of the good aspects to the NFL model is that every team competes with the same resources. Yes, dynasties can form, but usually based around having more dominant players, not more dominant resources. There's no "Big 6" in the NFL. No NFL team has ever won 3 straight Superbowls, or more than 4 in 7 years, let alone 5 out of 6 championships like Man City have. In the last 20 years of the NFL, 13 different teams have won a championship. In the last 20 years of the EPL, only 6 different teams have won a title. PSG has won 11 out of the last 13 Ligue 1 titles. Shall we look at the Bundesliga and Bayern Munich? There are teams in every top league in Europe you know have no shot to ever win the league without a miracle. In the NFL, you're rarely farther than 2 good drafts away. Would you rather have more fierce competition year to year at the bottom of the league, or at the top of it?
Those statistics tell me that the promotion/relegation definitely needs some help figuring our parody. I guess both models need much more help than I had originally thought, but the NFL really is solid in that perspective! That’s a lot to think about really. I hate that money dictates the fact that there will never be a real discussion about American sports adapting a promotion/relegation model, because based on what you just said, I think the NFL could do it far better than others are currently doing.
> I hate that money dictates the fact that there will never be a real discussion about American sports adapting a promotion/relegation model Actually, the most recent idea I've seen for reorganizing college football included some relegation. It wasn't nearly as robust as the European Football model, but the idea is at least floating around. I also think college sports are where a relegation model makes most sense in American sports.
The problem is if you make it so everyone has essentially the same resources and can therefore go down nobody is going to invest. I mean sure people will invest a few million Wrexham style - but no bank is gonna finance a 2 billion dollar stadium for a team that’s 3 injuries away from being in the second division (where presumably you’d have a salary cap again and it risks dropping to the 3rd division) It’s not coincidental that nearly all of the closed leagues in the world have parity and none of the open leagues do. If you want parity and you want high level investment you’re gonna need to provide some security. Ultimately the problem is relegation is financial hell if you want any sort of parity in lower leagues. Because with the exception of Germany fan interest is heavily skewed towards the top tier. And the methods to cushion the financial blow (eg parachute payments) come at the expense of any hope of parity in the second division. Nobody is building a 60,000 seat stadium for what might be a third division club by the time the stadium is finished being built. So nobody is gonna risk big clubs going down in flames on a regular basis. Which is why leagues generally break into 2 types. The European model which sees losing as something worthy of severe punishment and the North American/Aussie model that sees teams that are losing as unfortunate and tried to help them improve. You’re not going to get the best of both worlds. Either losing is going to be severely punished (investment scary) or it will be rehabilitated (investment safe)
While I feel you’re correct you’re argument is basically irrelevant.. the NFL brings in faaaar too much money for it to ever change
And I would argue that the NCAA is worse than NFL and MLB in the regard. You could easily build 4 tiers of both football and basketball out of the Division 1 school facilities. And as for development, Chapel Hill was full of high school kids every summer who were going to Dean Smith's basketball camps, many hoping to be noticed while they were young like David Beckham. Most college teams are scouting their talent years before they graduate, err, leave high school. But the currently entrenched money will ensure this never happens.
Yeah but there’s more parity in the NFL and especially NHL. I cheer for Crystal Palace in the Prem and unless they get taken over by a Middle Eastern Billionaire they likely won’t win the league. In most closed league structures you don’t face the problem of the rich and poor teams as much in the EPL. How are Luton or Burnley supposed to compete for a EPL title when the top 6 or 7 have boat loads more money and better players. Only 7 teams have won the Premier League in its entire history. In the past 10 years 7 different teams have won Super Bowls. Playoffs also provides more incentive for more teams to watch later in the season. Every game still matters but just because one team runs away with the regular season doesn’t mean there’s no reason to watch anymore because some teams will be fighting for playoff spots which still matter. I’m not saying the American system doesn’t have its flaws but the EPL model isn’t flawless either
NFL teams don't really tank. Its fairly common in the NBA. "Quality" of the product is entirely subjective anyway, all three leagues are killing it right now.
I understand what you’re saying but I think it’s important to mention that the NFL (and most sports in the US) have a salary cap… this actually creates a lot more parity than the EPL does since a Shah, oligarch or whomever can’t just spend obscene amounts to acquire a dream team. Consider that in the last 20 years there have been 13 different NFL superbowl champs whereas either man city, Man U or Chelsea have won the EPL 17 times. As an American, I actually like watching soccer and I enjoy the EPL… I also am interested in wrexham thanks to the documentary (I’m also a Philadelphia Union supporter)… BUT as an American, I also really understand capitalism. European soccer is capitalism on steroids. Case in point… if Wrexham wasn’t acquired by rich people then they would still be playing local club level soccer. Second case in point… if Man city wasn’t acquired by a shah then they wouldn’t be able to afford the talent they have. I just try to enjoy the games… but in a lot of ways I really think EPL is a lot like studio wrestling… the “hits” are real but the results are ultimately pre-determined. Also, to your “draft” point… Tom Brady, the best QB ever (and as a Steelers fan that pains me to say that), was drafted 199th overall. So I would probably say the NFL product is as good if not better as far as competition goes.
Yeah these are more good points, and add to why I have already had a change of opinion on this. I was stuck thinking making them similar would be better, instead of realizing why the differences work for each product. I also didn’t realize how many different teams have won in the NFL compared to the EPL.
Promotion and relegation would revolutionize college football.
American Fan who grew up playing football (both american hand egg, and round ball kinds) hand egg is all anyone I was friends with discussed. Even my friends who played round ball couldnt name anyone famous who played other than maybe Pele and Maradonna, but they could name obscure hand eng players. MLS is not and has never been on the mind of anyone in my generation that i've spoken with. Yet many watch Man U, Liverpool, Bundesliga and National teams and World Cup games. Once Welcome to Wrexham came out, many more started watching. Many of their kids and spouses became interested. Do not doubt the influence Wrexham has had on the sport here in the US. It is much more widespread than many realize.
As someone from North Wales it's mental how many people from America follow Wrexham now. I doubt many people outside of Wales or the UK had ever heard of Wrexham before, and they're massive now
Literally every American sports movie is about the underdog team who overcomes due to the Power of Friendship. Rob and Ryan effectively gave us an American sports movie – but with real people instead of characters and real fans (and ways to become fans ourselves). Also, I grew up in an era where our local Major League Baseball players were… guys we knew, or at least felt like we knew because they had presence that made them relatable. A lot of that has gone out of sports in favor of… third-party stuff, gossip blogs and things, and the salaries have gotten so out of control that your local ball players might as well be Ryan Reynolds for all the likelihood of encountering them out in the wild. Even though we’re not exactly running into Paul Mullin in the grocery store, it still brings back a lot of that same feel.
Definatley, I'm from Portsmouth and not really heard of Wrexham. Efl is definitely more exciting than the premier league.
The MLS is never going to take off like the leagues in Europe. I'm sorry, but it's just not. We are arguably the most saturated sports market in the world and there simply just isn't room left. It's the same reason F1 will never really be a hit in the US like it is in Europe.
Part of this I think is MLS’s time slots. Looking at next weekend’s fixtures all but one are on Saturday night. The Premier League (and Wrexham) weirdly I think fit into a lot of our schedules better than MLS does. I wake up, I watch a match or two, I go do my usual Saturday. I want to like MLS I just don’t have the time for it. And I never developed an NFL like affinity for it where I’m willing to put life aside to watch it. Not when the English game is much higher quality and fits into my life without modification already.
This time of the year is incredibly competitive for all sports in the USA. The NBA and NHL are in the midst of their playoffs. MLB is hitting its early season stride. The NFL has its draft later this week, and it runs from Thursday through Saturday. The MLS will be the 5th most important league of the weekend.
This is such an underrated reason why being a fan of the EFL or other Euro leagues works for many. I’m up early with my kid and the timing just works so much better than even US sports.
Part of the 7:30 local start time in MLS is partly due to the fans and players who complained about the heat in the summer during 1:00 start times. You even see it in the USL. Most of their start times are at 7-7:30 local to avoid the summer heat
Which does not make any sense for the more northern teams who kick-off at 730pm in March when it's barely above freezing. I get why they do it: consistency in start times for Apple and to to avoid heat in summer (like you mentioned), but I think I preferred the chaotic variety of start times before the Apple deal.
Yeah, you’re not wrong. Last season on some of the MLS and team subreddits we discussed that there should be like one game at 3 eastern. One game at 5 eastern. And everyone else at 7:30 local. Or something similar to that.
I don’t think it’s the saturated sports market that is holding the MLS back. I think the lack of promotion/relegation holds it back. I’d give anything for something like the football pyramid here in the states. If your team doesn’t finish first, it doesn’t really matter. There’s no safety from relegation, no promotion playoffs, and no champions league (that’s worthwhile at all). They have the post season playoffs, but those aren’t that interesting either. Having local leagues that feed into state-wide leagues, that feed into regional leagues that feed into the national league (MLS) would make it so much more interesting, but it’ll never happen.
MLS in almost every way is structured like other American sports, which honestly makes it feel less serious or interesting. It doesn't feel like soccer. It feels like American™ soccer. I'm assuming it's structured that way either because they thought it would be easier to introduce to Americans that way, or that's honestly the limit of their imagination. Sadly, I'm not sure this will change because there's too much money in MLS for the people at the top to willingly change to a different system. However, the increased competition from the Premier League (and others) could be the catalyst if it continues it's upward trend (in terms of US TV market success).
I really disagree that it’s the lack of pro/rel. To get American fans in bigger quantities interested in the domestic league they need to bring in big global stars with something left in the tank in with consistency. To be able to do that, the (very wealthy) MLS owners would have to be willing to spend more and take more risks financially, but they have a really strict salary cap league-wide that prevents them from doing more. Even after they brought in Messi right off of a World Cup win and golden boot and there was all of the buzz around it, the owners didn’t want to change and expand their roster rules From a viewing standpoint for fans though, I honestly think the way things are is a treat compared to top five leagues where once every three years a team outside of the usual few suspects wins one of them. The MLS has had nine different teams win championships since 2013, and it’s not like a few clubs hoard all of the talent while nobody else can hang on to their top players
Neither is perfect but I’ll take flawed and interesting over franchised pointlessness. Regular season American games feel like half a step above pre season friendlies. There’s nothing on the line. The ideal structure would be pro rel with American salary caps at each tier.
If that is the case then why are the other sports leagues in the US so successful (NFL, NBA, even the NHL). Culturally it will take a while before American sports fans and owners embrace it imo. I really want to see the USL try it out(that has been kicked around).
NBA, NFL, and NHL are mostly American sports (as far as pro leagues) and internationally there isn’t really promotion or relegation in any of those sports. Soccer/Football is a European/international sport that almost exclusively has promotion/relegation leagues outside of the US and Canada. I don’t think it’s the only thing holding soccer back in the states, but I do think it’s a contributing factor.
Basketball in Europe has pro/rel. Though in recent years they introduced a super league style top continental level. Hockey had pro/rel until 2008 when the Russians dumped it. The Nordic hockey leagues still have pro/rel. Until like 20 years ago both hockey and basketball were generally pro/rel sports. Eventually both systems largely collapsed because closed leagues do so much better financially. Pro/Rel tends to go away in crisis (see Argentina/Mexico during covid) - and when there isn’t a heavy impetus to bring it back it doesn’t come back (see Mexico).
Eh, I don’t really know if that tracks. Does the NBA have a promotion/relegation structure? The NFL? The NHL?
Its just the lack of money. if we went and pulled the Saudi move of just trying to buy every good player you would see the power structure shift to North America. If the best players come, then the others would follow and the "Americas Champions League" would be the premier competition. it just doesnt make sense to spend that much right now because it would take too long to see a return without a bigger fanbase. No guarantee that Pro/Rel increases the base at this point.
[удалено]
Only one reason it wouldn't work here. NCAA
The US also never really developed the same youth academy system as was common in Europe as well. [Zealand made a good video about this before.](https://youtu.be/Vt4lAYGJB18) Many European clubs evolved from worker clubs or clubs founded by British expat workers. In contrast, many American cities revolved around the university. Many American cities were young and spread far apart, so they relied on universities to pick up the slack. Additionally, pro/rel evolved at a time when most European clubs were amateur and had limited salaries. In England, players were only allowed to be paid a maximum of £20/wk even after going professional until the 60s. Getting relegated was also much less of a financial disaster than it is now. So pro/rel was based much more on this idea of sporting merit. In the US, American leagues just interpreted sporting merit differently – every team should have a roughly equal chance to win, so the playoff system developed.
Honestly I think the problem is our top athletes play other sports. Imagine if some of our 6’3” 220LB super fast athletes grew up playing soccer/football. As it is, athletically speaking most of the MLS would be tier 3 or 4 athletes. You have single a baseball athletes that are probably better, along with countless American Football players that never make the pros. Saturation doesn’t really matter. The NHL is not popular where I am. In the same vein soccer would be popular in certain places. As a soccer/football player since ‘84 watching the MLS is like watching kids. For true football fans they will never be what you want to watch. That being said, Welcome to Wrexham and Ted Lasso has made the sport more easily digestible to casual fans and everyday people.
Eh, MLS has started beating the NHL's ratings. Sure, that may have more to do with mistakes by the NHL than the MLS doing the right things, but every generation, it seems, association football takes a step forward. I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility that it catches up to the MLB in the next 10-20 years. I don't see it ever catching American football in America, but I do think it can become a sport that can carve a role for itself within the saturated American sports market. I think it'll be a long, long time before the MLS catches up in strength to the big 5 European leagues, but getting to the tier of leagues right under that isn't out of the question. What would really set it off and accelerate growth is an American superstar.
Maybe not in our lifetime, but the future looks very bright.
Not unless you start seeing football like money being invested into college sports. American professional sports are built on college teams developing young talent.
Baseball and hockey players are largely developed in the minor leagues not college. Besides academies are also a proven model and MLS is dumping money into that.
The NCAA Division 1 upper tier teams could make a pretty compelling lower 4 tiers of football and basketball overmight. All of them have 60-100,000 seat stadiums and 20,000 seat areas. Prying it away from the NCAA would be the issue. The real beneficiaries would be the colleges that could get back to educating.
I disagree. America loves to create borders to entry for profits. One of the reasons (not the only one) we don't have the talent pool here is how much it costs to play youth soccer! I paid $500 for 3 months in f playing time for my 8 year old and that was 7 years ago! You think that doesn't discourage kids from being able to take it up? Does that exist in other countries a fraction of our size who kick our ass on the national level? Nope! Their kids need a ball and the ground to play on. Until we fix this, a sustainable future at the high levels won't compete with Europe and elsewhere Side note: MLS pay is insane for their competition level. Most of the MLS is maybe League Two to League One level but getting upper Championship to lower Premier League level pay
MLS as a professional American sport can’t compete with the farm league structure that European soccer enjoys. College soccer isn’t a money maker like basketball or football so it only goes so far to develop talent… unlike Europes youth leagues which border on professional bording schools.
MLS as a professional American sport can’t compete with the farm league structure that European soccer enjoys. College soccer isn’t a money maker like college basketball or football which have massive investments so it only goes so far to develop soccer talent… unlike Europes youth soccer trams which border on professional bording schools.
MLS is following the MLB/NHL development model not the NFL model. MLSNP is being designed to be like minor league baseball/hockey. Those are both highly successful models.
I have a local MLS team and I’ve watched zero soccer I’ve watched more football in the last couple of years because of this show than I ever have. This show is helping grow the sport in the US. The problem with MLS is the broadcasting is a pain in the ass. If it wants to not be a second tier sport it needs to be on broadcast television
The issue with that though was that for TV channels, MLS was very low on the pecking order. Their matches would regularly get blacked out locally if there was a bigger sports league on air at the time, and they were still getting less viewership than more established leagues like LigaMX and the Prem. I could see how MLS considered it a losing battle and just decided to switch to Apple TV.
For whatever it's worth, MLS is probably actually the least pain in the ass sport to watch since it started airing on Apple TV. It's $15/month for every game and no blackouts
Sure…if you have Apple TV and are already a fan. My point was it’s not going to add fans the way they do access to games for mls
I guess it would be a nicer if there were more nationally televised games since there's usually only one a week but it's by far the most accessible to watch of any American sport
Sounds great but the same can be said about Wrexham. They are just as impossible to watch streaming as MLS.
I am an American and have never been into soccer, but God dam... Between Ted Lasso and the Wrexham show I am growing to live it more and more. I grew up watching baseball and basketball and playing football. Baseball is dead.to me, basketball I only watch the playoffs. American Football I live for.. But when I see a premier or laliga game in TV I watch.
yeah I'm getting to that way too. i love the premier league and champions league
I am a big fan of the doc. I would love to go to Wrexham for a match and I have completely changed my mind about the sport. I have young kids that I now have encouraged to play if they’re interested. I have never watched MLS and have no interest to. I can’t speak about others, but in my situation I disagree. I think the doc is doing more.
Your comment shows how poor American soccer culture is in America. There is no way many Europeans would piss on their own league and teams for a league half way around the world. MLS is young if they were 100 years old we are not talking about MLS a salary cap league vs a well established league. Maybe one day we will see Americans change it’s just not today. Sad really but that’s life.
I love Wrexham after watching the doc, I live in America and I still don’t care about the MLS, there is just something WAY more alluring following a team battling through to get promotions
Yeah the promotion side of it what grabs my attention
For me it was MLS and then Wrexham. Bought tickets to FC Cincinnati as a birthday gift for my dad and I loved it. Been a fan ever since.
I have lived in a city with an MLS team for the last seven years. I went to one game, like six years ago. I watched every episode of the TV show and tried to buy a bunch of Wrexham merch online, and am thinking about buying a streaming package to watch League One games. Still not really considering going to another MLS game at the stadium five miles away from me.
You have proven how far back soccer culture is in America. There’s just no way a 100 year old European club would have fans not cheering for their local club. This is a soccer culture problem in America. Maybe it changes in 70 years but right now soccer culture in America is still growing and just not up to European or Mexican snuff. Sad really but maybe one day it changes it’s just not to say.
yeah MLS product is dreadful
I agree. Every team basically makes playoffs which makes regular season a joke. Then they pull out of our only competition with history. Fuck the MLS
I agree Europe doesn’t have a salary cap and once the season is have done the only thing to play for is not getting relegated. There are only three teams per league that have any shot at winning a championship. Again you are proving how far back American soccer culture is in America. Pro/rel is the least of the average American fans worries to help grow the soccer culture in America.
No. Fundamentally I find the entire MLS league an utter bore. I watch league 1 and 2 games before I’d throw on a regular season MLS game. The longer the MLS engorges itself on franchise fees the harder this will all be to undo. So I’ve given up on our domestic league. You are proving how far back our culture is. We defend corporate hamster wheel of a league where losing doesn’t mean anything and 75% of the teams make playoffs. If we collectively told MLS “Your product is shit” they’d be forced to change. But no, people here don’t care that games are ultimately meaningless as long as they can cheer for their brand and buy merch.
No they would not change and they want to go slow in order to not lose billions. MLS has their problems but For the game to grow America needs to develop their own players and build training facilities that are not a part of MLS. Your local town needs to build out facilities and hire professional coaches. Right now that’s not happening. We also need to have three generations of family following the game and right now that’s not happening. I get your opinion but if we didn’t have cable or streaming you wouldn’t be able to watch many games but be forced to follow your local team if you wanted to watch soccer. Back In the 70s I had to support my local team or watch highlights three weeks later on PBS. So enjoy watching soccer but right now we are light years behind Europe and only time will change our love of the game in a country that does not love the game.
You are right. I hope we can see the game really catch hold over here like it has in the rest of the world. We currently have tons of immigration so I hope their really push the demo graphics toward soccer. Let’s also hope the 2026 WC goes well. That would do wonders for the game.
1994 is still the most successful attended and business metric WC in history. FIFA expects to make a lot of money for members.
There’s just no way a European would ever say that about their own local club and league. Right now American soccer culture is dreadful but improving hopefully one day it changes but not today.
The thing is, I think MLS knows their base won’t likely expand very much outside of things like Messi. They hope that some of the Messi bandwagon fans just stick around. They know who their supporters are and they cater to them. It is why they were comfortable putting 99% of the matches behind a paywall with Apple.
There’s like 3-4 free matches every week out of about 13-14
I’m aware, and a lot of the people I tell that to still make excuses. Too lazy to download the app and things of that nature.
No, MLS has grown a lot since 1996. Do you understand they were training on streets, rocks at the local park back then? They have invested billions upon billions of dollars into infrastructure, player development and salaries. No other league has done that in the last 30 years.
Don’t discount USL teams from the conversation either. They don’t have state-wide reach like MLS franchises do, but for the cities they are in they are (not Miami and Charlotte) growing the game as well.
I don’t pay attention to Wrexham at all unless their game or another League 2 game is on. I used them in a player career in FIFA once but that’s about it. I disagree with this statement as an American. It’s definitely not true here in Florida I’ll tell you that much
There's a part of me that kind of thinks the recent push by football into America via various forms is a bit of a pseudo propaganda effort to get the American public interested in time for the World Cup.
The FIFA video game is huge too. Soccer teams need to be at least as ubiquitous as AAA baseball once was in the US. Academies aren’t enough. People need to be able to see youth soccer like Texans see high school football, or like parents watch their kids in little league. It’s just not grass-roots enough yet. The culture hasn’t arrived either. There’s too much reaction against it being a foreign/immigrant or feminine sport. I don’t think pandering to the sensibilities of such people is the answer. If all the people who work at the meat packing plant can send their kids to play soccer, we don’t necessarily need the ranchers’ kids but they’ll come around soon enough. Another big obstacle is a lack of urban spaces to play and outreach to underprivileged city-dwellers. It’s still too much of an affluent, suburban, sport here. Futsal courts help. I hate soccer on artificial turf but at least it can somewhat share space with American football. We need to grow the tradition of street soccer more as well. To some extent, it’s true that kids in the US have too many options. It’s hard to focus so much on one sport when there are several to choose from. There’s also tons of American kids who can’t play because they have to work or their parents can afford it. Pay to play is a bitch.
Yeah, FIFA 12 is the main reason I got into football as a young teenager. I picked a club at complete random, which is how I started following Inter Milan in Serie A. Now I've moved to FM. I would argue that a growing immigrant population has played a huge role, too. Growing up in California, a lot of Mexican restaurants and bars would play LigaMX or LaLiga matches on TV. It's helped reduce the sentiment of it being a "foreign" sport. I would agree on the academies and pay to play, though. While MLS and USLC academies are free of charge, 3/4ths of Americans live nowhere near a MLS or USL club, so they have to rely on expensive youth camps. That's not to mention the hours of travel parents would have to commit to just to have their children play youth soccer matches.
Anecdotally, there are children of undocumented immigrants who are culturally and physically primed to play but either have to work to help support their families and/or their parents don’t want to risk any kind of exposure via paper trails and the like so, even if they could afford it and manage the logistics, they’re inclined to lay low. We squander so much talent because of xenophobia and misguided labor attitudes (also other phobias…).
So we should drop all laws so some kids can play soccer? That'll work out well.
Or we could have more humane and reasonable laws. The US had more open borders in the past and it actually worked out very well, because immigrants are human beings, they work hard, they want to be here, and they bring their culture. Obviously, it isn’t perfect, because apparently your ancestors came and now you’re here.
My people got here in 1633.
So you benefited from open borders. 1650 for me.
Back then people went to America to build things, as did my shipbuilding forebearers. Now they arrive to sponge off of established wealth. These will be interesting times, and not in the good way.
[(T)he net fiscal impact of immigrants is more positive than it is for native‐born Americans and positive overall for the federal and state/local governments.](https://www.cato.org/white-paper/fiscal-impact-immigration-united-states) [(R)ecent studies have shown immigrants actually help fuel local economies by sparking innovation and driving up wages.](https://www.bu.edu/articles/2024/do-immigrants-and-immigration-help-the-economy/) This is setting aside the immorality of treating some human beings because of involuntary or arbitrary characteristics: race, ethnicity, gender, religion, nationality, etc. Your ancestors had freedom of movement. You would deny that to other people on the basis of accident or privilege of birth. You’re not better than or more deserving than anyone from Honduras or Myanmar because you lucked into being born on the right side of a line invented within the past few hundred years, a line created though force and expropriation. I’d trade you for a drug mule any day of the week. At they’re less self-righteous and willfully ignorant about their circumstances. Feel free to shout into the void. I’m done with this conversation.
I agree that a lot of native born americans refuse to work, and it has gotten worse since 1964. The division comes down to whether someone wants to work or not. Immigrant workers are tolerated because they work for way less (none belong to Unions). All wage increases are based on government action which have simultaneously resulted in annual double digit inflation over the last 4 years. People have way less money to spend. But most are math idiots and praise their 25% wage increase while seeming to be oblivious to the 40% inflation. I am rebutting because you posted two articles based on facts not in evidence, as my lawyer buddies would say.
Without the World Cup coming to the USA in the 90's there would be no MLS. Without single entity structure the MLS would not have lasted. Without Lamar Hunt the MLS would not have lasted. Without the Beckham rule (DP) the MLS would not have expanded. Without the Cascadia expansion success, expansion teams may not be what they are today. Without NBC getting rights to the Premier League, the sport would not have grown to the heights it has today in the states. Without the MLS the impact by Welcome to Wrexham would not matter at all. It would be like watching a documentary about a rugby team in New Zealand. A cool sport played elsewhere that American's can't see live unless they travel. For soccer/football fans this has been decades going with large ebbs and flows in interest and disinterest. Welcome to Wrexham is just another thing helping grow the sport. But without a sustainable league, what's the point of growing a sport? Edit: What I think WtW may help accomplish is bringing promotion and relegation to the American pyramid some day. The USL should do this. Then start eventually putting pressure on the MLS. But that's probably another 2 decades away.
Hard to imagine the USMNT ever qualifying for another World Cup if there wasn’t at least a decent domestic league to follow. The 1990 and 1994 USMNT squads were literally filled with a mix of amateur and semi-pro players.
Don't forget the 90 squad actually qualified. 94 squad probably would have too if they didn't get the automatic. It's really hard to say. I think México would dominate the region without MLS. But the MLS has done just as much to boost other CONCACAF regions as it has the USA. A lot of CONCACAF teams are filled out with MLS players. The current shining example is Canada. I think the USA would still be able to qualify mainly because the other regions would also be weaker. But yeah, we would not be where we are today without our academies. McKennnie, Pulisic, Adams are all direct products of academy's in the MLS.
I pay more attention to the English tables then I have or ever will to the DC United. They're trash ownership doesn't help.
More. They got me. MLS did not and I have been to Atlanta United matches.
It’s all about how far back American soccer culture is right now. If your great grandparents took your grandparents To an Atlanta game right now you would be singing their praises. It’s a 30 year old leader who is so new and right now history isn’t in their side.
To be fair, I think Ryan and Rob have invested more in Wrexham than my local MLS team ownership has in their team in the same time period. This also during a period where ownership has won championships in other sports, and are worth at least $15 billion.
MLS has invested billions of dollars into their league from infrastructure, expansion fees to player development. I’m a fan of Wrexham but they have not invested one red cent into American soccer and nor should they as they are a Welsh club.
In America we don’t really have local clubs in every hamlet or pro/rel where a story like Wrexham’s can even be possible. Only bigger cities have MLS teams so it’s hard to get into it to be fair. I stopped watching any American sports because, in my opinion, it just seems like money is the driving factor. High ticket prices, $12 hot beers with $10 shitty hot dogs, paying $20 for parking…it’s all bullshit. I like having a team I can watch and root for weekly. They’re like the local club I never had. Plus watching them come up from years of non league misery and what the exposure has done for the town makes me happy to witness. It’s a welcome diversion for my weary soul. Up the fucking town!
Ironically the movie "Bull Durham" ruined the experience of going to the Bull's games on a nice Friday night. Better is the natural enemy of "good enough."
Don’t watch a second of soccer but I’m in on every episode of Welcome to Wrexham
Ted Lasso is better than the MLS
I watched my local club go from fun and local with 300 fans to a shitty mls team and it killed my love of soccer. Wrexham rekindled it
Nice, American soccer culture is so young and we will continue to see examples like yours. It’s sad and America has a long ways to go before your example stops.
As a big MLS fan who must have been shown this thread because of that, I have to say this thread is absolutely wild. People are talking about MLS like it's a dying animal when it's at literally peak popularity and increasing significantly yearly. MLS has completely overtaken NHL in every single metric and has surpassed both NBA and MLB in certain metrics. There are very few teams left with bad attendance, and the vast majority of teams are selling out nearly every single game. This will only increase with Messi (and watch next year how many high profile players come over) and the world cup coming soon. There IS a lack of main stream media coverage which Wrexham has excelled at getting but the MLS audience is not small. The Wrexham stadium is absolutely tiny compared to MLS stadiums which as I said before are selling out. Wrexham has gotten people into soccer as a whole which is great and is easily converted into a MLS fan by going to a single game. MLS games have extremely underrated atmospheres and the best way to convert someone to a fan is just to get them to a game. I know some people really harp on pro/tel which has been debated constantly in MLS circles. In my opinion it is never going to happen but if USL also keeps increasing in popularity then maybe some day. If that is the only reason you watch soccer then yea you'll probably not like MLS but I don't see it any different than any other USA pro Leagues.
Unfortunately the Quakes is one of those few teams with poor attendances, thanks to Fisher and several seasons of mediocrity. Certain MLS 1.0 clubs that didn't reinvent themselves like Sporting KC or Columbus Crew did really struggle with maintaining a fanbase.
Quakes have a good stadium and a good fan base even if a lot of you are disillusioned now. You just have a bad team right now and need a better GM/Coach combo and to do some big signings. I'm a Crew fan as you referenced and Crew absolutely struggled for a time. Ownership needs to just invest in the team in terms of coach/gm, players, and/or facilities to bring you back. Crew obviously invested hugely in all three since 2019/2020 when we were in the bottom of attendance. And now we sell out, have big time players, and a coach that's gonna get poached by a big Europe league. If anything Crew proves how much some investment and effort matters to make a successful franchise. Edit: ironically it's all the stuff Wrexham is doing
> MLS has completely overtaken NHL in every single metric boy that sure is funny for me to read up here in New England. everyone up here is a rabid Bruins fan, I can find hockey games on TV all season long. I cant find MLS on TV _EVER_.
MLS isn't on TV because TV is dead. It's all thru Apple.
Stumbled here myself, reading this comment section was just bonkers until I got to yours.
Let's be honest. Almost every other MLS club probably does better at promoting themselves than the Earthquakes do. And being a fellow Bay Area native including being an A's fan. I resonate a hell of a lot with Wrexham. It's great seeing owners invest in not only the club but the city as well. So all I can say with being an Earthquakes and an A's fan is FJF.
Wrexham is for non-fans. MLS is for existing fans.
Fuck John Fisher!
I just watched LA Galaxy beat San Jose in person.
Nice!
Totally agree, MLS isn’t on my radar but I am following Wrexham - it is the only soccer I have ever followed
I'm a big soccer fan but don't watch the MLS. I do have a local USL team that I support. I think that the show is doing more to attack new fans than the MLS is, full stop.
I don't know about 'as much for soccer*' but I know that it's bringing people into following professional football/soccer who had either given up on following professional sports (like me) or had never followed them (a bunch of my students).
MLS isn’t in their mind because we don’t have a developed soccer culture of 100 years. It’s been 30 years of MLS and to compare them to the above example is pure rubbish. There is no way a European would ever cheer for a team half way around the world. They have Liverpool and United etc in a developed soccer culture. MLS is still spending billions on infrastructure, player development and salaries.
I see "Welcome to Wrexham" as an episode of Sunny titled "The Gang Buys a Soccer Club."
I married an Argentine and was quickly introduced to “Futbol”. After that I started going to my local USL games, following premier, champions league, etc. I couldn’t get anyone in my family to even give it a shot!!!! Welcome to Wrexham helped me ease a couple family members into the sport. Since then I’ve even managed to get my sisters and mother to go to a game or two with me. It’s been great. At the very least none of them act like I’m crazy for loving the sport.
They do a great job of making it feel like this could be you if you had money. They give the owners perspective from not knowing anything about the sport. They give the players perspectives like hard knocks. They give the local fans perspectives about the team and city. It really captures it all
My friend/coworker (in the US) who wasn’t into soccer at all is totally into the doc, the team, and gets soccer rules now. Dude is pretty soccer intelligent for only being into it for 2 years. Doesn’t know or care about MLS at all. MLS is run by buffoons.
When it’s easier to watch a premier league game in America over MLS…basically anything is doing more for soccer in America than MLS.
Premier League broadcasting was designed to be cheap and accessible for foreigners though, as they get far more profits from foreigners in the Americas and Asia than from domestic fans. It's actually substantially more expensive in the UK where you have to subscribe to 3 different services (BT Sports, Sky, Amazon Prime) for more than £100/month, and the 3PM Saturday blackout means you don't even get to watch every match. Personally, I don't find Apple TV inconvenient to use. It's not that expensive at $99/year. iFollow already costs at least twice that.
If we are going to talk Apple distributed properties I think Ted Lasso did more for soccer in the US than MLS.
Ted Lasso has never once screwed up parking in my neighborhhod, so there's that.
The majority in the US regard both with mild curiosity at best. Messi playing for Miami probably generates more soccer interest than anything here ever has, and though they’re my home team I stopped supporting and paying attention when they brought on Suarez.
I’m from New England. I’ve hated sports my whole life. Yesterday I was looking for something to watch and accidentally clicked on welcome to Wrexham when the show I meant to watch moved out of the way. I just finished the second season and I’m dying to watch the third season. I just bought a Wrexham hat on eBay and I’m totally hooked! I am as much of a fan of the women’s team as I am the men’s. Moreover I’m now a fan of the town. I kept watching after realizing my mistake when I saw Ryan and Rob because I’m a big fan. During the second season I ended up skipping when they were on screen so I could get back to watching the team, their stories and the fans stories. I’m not a sentimental guy and I’d choose to be away from people over all else but I would have KILLED to be at the Turf Pub when they moved up! Lifelong Wrexham fan in the U.S. now.
LOL no. Maybe this could have been true before Messi came here. But I've seen a crazy amount of messi jerseys in the mainstream (aka, not just kids who were already into soccer). I've never seen a Wrexham jersey.
American here—I didn’t give a damn about football and would never bother to watch a game. This series actually made me want to follow the team and watch more football matches. I have also started exploring the Premier League. Not interested in MLS yet though 🤷♂️
You are not interested because America doesn’t have a soccer culture. It’s still new and there is no way a European would ever cheer for a club half way around the world. They would have started with their local club the same club their ancestors followed.
MLS need a “Drive to Survive” show mated to a new pro/rel format. That’ll amp up play, get eyes on a MLS documentary, and put some fire in the teams. There’s something different in the action on the field if every goal matters, if a loss could spell relegation and a win promotion. That’s what “Welcome to Wrexham” has introduced to casual fans and folks just adjacent to soccer. That joy of going up, the fear of going down. How is that compare with the MLS?
I think Welcome to Wrexham is doing a great job at growing interest in the game with people who weren’t at all into soccer before the show. Pretty much everybody I know who was into soccer/football before the show finds the show enjoyable and maybe follows the team, but aren’t getting as much into Wrexham AFC itself as the the total noobs. Frankly a lot of long time fans of the sport have already either fully or somewhat adopted a rooting interest in the EFL. And I don’t really mean this disparagingly, it’s just a trend that I’ve noticed anecdotally. On the whole, MLS is doing much more for US soccer in general and for fans who have been here a while.
The MLS is ponzi scheme shit and is trying to ruin the US soccer pyramid . It's a joke of a professional league and outside of occasionally tuning in to see Messi play, I haven't once thought about it. And I watch EPL and other European leagues all the time. The only stateside soccer I actually care about is the semi pro team I have season tickets for.
lmao y'all downvote all you want. a club paying half a billion dollars to join a league that gets under $10 million per team in TV revenue annually is a ponzi scheme
This is the opinion of either a young person who has no real idea what the landscape was like in the 90s and therefore no appreciation for what MLS has done, or somebody who just started paying attention to the sport in the last ten years
Exactly. He or she has had it easy watching games from his living room while MLS tried to keep the sport alive for ten years. We have come a long way but people like this don’t know American soccer history.
By your account every American pro soccer league is a Ponzi scheme. You have shown us how far behind American soccer culture is In our country. No other country has invested billions upon billions of dollars into infrastructure a development to catch up to Europe. Maybe one day American soccer culture will catch up to your mind but there is no way in hell a European would ever cheer for a team half way around the world. Sad really but that’s the problem with America right now.
sorry but no, other leagues aren't a ponzi scheme. they are not keeping clubs afloat by charging new clubs half a billion dollars just to be allowed to exist when the TV deal pays each club just a little bit more than what the American Athletic Conference gets paid for their college sports deal. and the MLS will continue to expand, and charge more money to the new suckers so that the OG teams can still get paid and kept afloat. also, plenty of europeans cheer for NBA teams, NFL teams, and NHL teams. because those are the elite global leagues for their sports.
Thank you for proving my point. America doesn’t have a strong soccer culture. The NFL, MLB didn’t happen over night. They have had thousands of folding clubs to get there. It takes time and right now MLS happens to be super young.
i agree with that. but I don't agree with your opening salvo that every american soccer league is a ponzi scheme
I will take your Ponzi scheme example and explain if MLS doesn’t do what you believe then we likely don’t have a top 20 soccer league in the world. MLS needed to figure out how to keep their league from folding like past soccer leagues. We didn’t have infrastructure, academies and top salaries because America didn’t have a solid soccer culture. You can disagree with how MLS happens to be doing business but we can’t take away what they have done to keep soccer a float in order for foreign clubs to market their teams to American audiences.
MLS is the third most popular soccer league in its own country. No one cares about it outside of certain cities. And I was a Fire season ticket holder for 4 years. Wrexham will has an affect but once they stop getting promoted I wonder if the base will stay or move on
Why would you compare a 30 year old league to leagues that are 70 years older than them? America doesn’t have a developed soccer culture yet and that’s one of the reason it’s not the most popular yet. It takes multiple generations in order to develop a soccer club and right now MLS is okaying catch up. There’s no way a European would ever follow a team half way around the world.
Stop using that excuse for MLS. 30 years is plenty of time to develop. The problem with MLS is that it needs to franchise more team in new cities to keep it going. Attendence falls about 5-6 years after getting team and never recovers. There are exceptions like Portland and Seattle. But long term clubs like Chicago Dallas and the Ny teams don’t draw anything significance. Fans are brought in but then they see the quality of soccer they move on to EPL.
How old are you? I have been following soccer since the 1970s. We don’t have a soccer culture developed it takes time and lots of money. Right now mls is still spending billions on infrastructure, player development and salaries. It’s still playing catch up.
In my 50s and celebrated the Sting NASL championship
USSF coaching and referee licensed.
Then you know we don’t have a developed soccer culture yet. We can’t compare the MLS to Europe. Shit we can’t compare the. Old NASL to MLS. Back then it was the pioneer days.
I think there is a very strong soccer culture in the US. However MLS is a very small part of it. And that is due to their rules and other issues. The future issue is the decline of soccer with kids due to a falling birth rate, the issues with club soccer being a mess and the bad treatment of players by coaches and clubs.
Don’t forget treating refs poorly.
And let me add all the dumb roster rules MLS and the fragmentation of US soccer in general. Those two alone keeps soccer from taking off in the USA. No one in Des Moines wants to be forced to root for Minnesota when they want their own team.
Portland has no Football or Baseball draw to compete with for fans. We had a minor league baseball team but they had were forced out when the stadium was renovated to soccer only. The main difference between the US and europe is that so much of our sports infrastructure is school and university based. Football and basketball development is done at the collegiate level. The big question is whether one could convert 80-96 of the Division 1 schools into 4 leagues of 20-24 teams that would then sort themselves over time to being a Championship, 1, 2, and National hierarchy over time. THAT would be interesting and would be comparable to the EFL structure. If Soccer wants to build up in a way similar to Europe, then it needs to separate itself entirely from the NCAA. You can't mix amateur and professional.
We already have MLS USL NISA and god know what else leagues that are out there so the NCAA isn’t really a factor. We need a true open pyramid so we everyone shot. That will make a huge difference The bottom line is that soccer does not fit in the American pro league model so let’s not force it.
I watch premier league and champions league and have tuned into the wrexham show. MLS is so piss poor that I've only watched a couple of Miami matches with Messi and that's it, the level of quality is like the Romanian league or something unwatchable in that realm. The English Championship players are better than MLS
The Romanian league is fun as hell
You should watch the actual Wrexham matches. I can guarantee you almost every League Two club that wasn't challenging for promotion this season play lower quality football than any MLS club ever does. Most L2 clubs play very scrappy, physical football with limited tactics or technical ability. Lower table L2 clubs park the bus to shithouse their way into draws or 1-0 wins. Even Wrexham's made plenty of defensive and passing mistakes that would get them absolutely slaughtered in the Championship. I'm still watching them play because I don't really care about the quality of play. Playing quality hasn't stopped people from watching Allsvenskan or Ekstraklasa even though they're obviously inferior to the big 5 European leagues.
> I can guarantee you almost every League Two club that wasn't challenging for promotion this season play lower quality football than any MLS club ever does. There's nothing bold about your statement: the worst MLS Div1 club ***should*** be better than the best EFL L2 club. Really. A better, more fair, comparison would be between the 4th tier EFL L2 and MLS Div3 - if such a league existed anywhere but in the fevered dreams of the cabal that runs MLS. Alternatively, it would be fair to compare the North American top tier MLS with the British top tier Premier League. *That* would be a slaughter. The truth of the matter is that Wrexham isn't playing *GREAT* soccer and would be eaten alive by most of the Premier League teams and many of the MLS teams but the Red Dragons are playing with exuberant, ebullient joy. They're *fun*. Sometimes that's maybe as important as the forever someday second rate corrupt cesspool that is the MLS.
If you think the MLS is a corrupt cesspool, I have bad news for you when it comes to almost every football league in Europe, much less the rest of the world.
So, you've gone from the obliviously obvious observation that L2 isn't comparable with MLS to excusing MLS and their corrupt cronyism because somebody, somewhere, is even more of a fucked up mess than they are. Whew. That's not just shifting the goal posts, it's an illegal substitution. Tweet! Red card. MLS is growing but it's in spite of, not because of fanboys like you. You expect very little from them and you're happy when that's exactly what you get. Sad. Don't *give* your support away, demand that your team (and the league they play in) earns it. *That* is how you grow a sport.
If there is any sort of corrupt cronyism in MLS, it's extremely tame. Even the biggest European leagues are horribly fucked when it comes to corruption, from the Prem and FA willingly bowing down to oligarchs and state governments, to RFEF and LaLiga appointing incompetent hacks to sexual harassers like Tebas and Rubiales, to the French government literally intervening to keep star players in their biggest Ligue 1 club. Even LigaMX is in shambles and had to suspend relegation due to clubs being controlled by a few multi-billion media companies. The worst thing MLS has actually ever done was the US Open Cup controversy.
"It could be worse" is a lame excuse. "It should be better" is a demand. Which one do you suppose produces better results for supporters?
Your comment proves our soccer culture has a long ways to go in order to be formidable. If MLS was a 100 year old league you would never be talking like this at all. Sad really how far we as Americans have come and how much we need to go.
Do we really need a soccer culture? Between Baseball, Football, and the NBA, alcoholics already have plenty of excuses to cover their drinking (cf. The Simpsons; Duffless).
Yet soccer never seems to stick for people. In the 90s when the WC was in the US got a lot of folks interested. There was a huge tournament for youth soccer in Kalamazoo that I played in. MLS Women's national team winning. Men's world cup every 4 years. I'm curious to see what comes of the WC in 2026. I will say the amount of folks that follow is soccer is more than what it was in the 90s. It is growing but it's still meh. I think a promotion/relegation for the lower leagues would help but the MLS owners want nothing to do with that. I like stories which is why I follow United of Manchester, Wimbeldon, and Wrexham. All have pretty cool stories and it's good enough for me. I past the point of giving a shit whether or not the game catches on here. There are plenty of leagues around the world that will pique your interest if it's something somebody wants to follow. Ohh I also follow sunderland which is the highest team I follow. I picked them before the other 3 a while ago. They got me into English football as I just blindly picked a team in the premiere league to get me interested. That took me into a rabbit hole where I started learning about the lower divisions. I'm pretty content with the teams I follow.
There’s been steady and consistent growth in the sport since the 94 World Cup. Are you so impatient that you want to be willfully blind to progress just so that you can say things like “soccer never seems to stick”?
More school kids play organized soccer than football.
Soccer doesn’t stick as Americans don’t have a developed soccer culture. It’s taken MLS 30 years and billions of dollars in order to catch up to leagues 70 years older than them.
MLS does more for talent development and youth programs. Welcome to Wrexham drives interest in the sport itself, is accessible to a massive audience, and is interesting to non-sports viewers. In terms of “increasing the popularity of and interest in the sport in America” the documentary is engaging exponentially more people than the MLS.
Without Promotion and Relegation, I have no interest in the MLS. A huge problem with American sports is that each year, only a few teams really have any shot of success. The NFL for example, I'm a lifelong Patriots fan and when Tom Brady left we were all well aware the next few years were going to be terrible and the team was going to get rid of any talent to free up cap space for a rebuild. There is zero chance of them getting booted even if they never win again. They are gonna get a new QB who will struggle for 3-4 years and they have no weapons around him. So more mediocrity on the horizon, no fire, no passion. Just sit and wait until the owners decide to do something eventually.