How much is too much?

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I agree with your point about baseball being scouted locally. Disagree with anyone that thinks that baseball is even remotely exciting. good lord most boring sport ever created.

Soccer gives you 90 minutes of action. cant see how anyone finds it boring, but i understand in the USA it is an acquired taste.

I played college baseball in the 80s. I love the game and enjoyed playing it. But I will have to agree with most of the people here that it is boring as hell to watch. When my son decided to play soccer over baseball I was ecstatic. Now I get to watch non-stop action instead of 5-minute at-bats with the player fixing his gloves after every pitch.

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What you said has been prophesied since I was a kid 40 years ago.

Demographics have greatly changed in my lifetime, but soccer has not in regards to popularity in the US.

Just as an example.

The awful, horrible MLB team, the Florida Marlins, sold for 1.2 BILLION DOLLARS recently.

The Seattle Sounders, the number 1 MLS franchise, are valued at $200+ Million by Forbes. That’s valuation only. We don’t know if they are really worth that.

Sorry, but MLS has a long way to go.

Who knows what future is of MLS, but I will say this, buyer of FL Marlins will come to greatly regret the purchase. Miami does not have the $$ base to support major league baseball. miami is much poorer than people think and people in suburbs will not make trip to the stadium even if they are baseball fans (many are NOT by the way) during the week. once you get there, no $$ invested at all in the surrounding area - that was all 100% a lie made up by Loria and his city/county enablers.

Miami marlins are a horrible investment; will never succeed Mas family much better off with Beckham miami - only has to fill up weekend games. Only thing that changes my opinion is if miami gets amazon Hq2.

[Unregistered]

I love soccer.

I love baseball.

I find both of them exciting.

Unfortunately, vastly more Americans view soccer as boring when compared to baseball.

That’s just the facts about the sports excitement opinions in America.

Until US Soccer can find a scouting equivalency to that of baseball.

No amount of politics and money can replace the sound that the ball makes off of a future major leaguers bat vs his peers or the speed on the radar gun vs his peers.

I have numerous friends in various aspects of MLB, and those two measurable things are the holy grails for hitting and pitching.

US soccers system is politically and money driven.

As you can tell, I’m a Yankees fan.

Find me the soccer equivalent story of Brett Gardner with a US player. Any Gender.

Gardner wasn’t scouted in high school, didn’t play travel ball ever because his family was working class and couldn’t afford it, only playing high school and local rec leagues.

He walked on to his college team, played, earned a scholarship, got drafted, played and starred for the Tigers and struck it big with the Yankees in his paycheck and World Series Ring.

Until that story can be replicated in soccer, soccer unfortunately will always be looked upon as the sport for the elites and haves in the USA.

How has the sport for the masses in the world become only for the wealthy in America?

Sad that you know nothing about soccer and its history. For starters, since he's American and you may relate better to it, check out the Jay Demerit story. There is a complete documentary that you can watch, which played in select theaters when it first came out, so not sure how you missed it, unless you are new to soccer. Soccer is a global sport, mostly played by people with no means and there are countless stories like Brent Gardner, ones that had no high school to go to, not college to walk onto, no scholarship to be earned. Stop living in you bubble.

[Unregistered]

Who knows what future is of MLS, but I will say this, buyer of FL Marlins will come to greatly regret the purchase. Miami does not have the $$ base to support major league baseball. miami is much poorer than people think and people in suburbs will not make trip to the stadium even if they are baseball fans (many are NOT by the way) during the week. once you get there, no $$ invested at all in the surrounding area - that was all 100% a lie made up by Loria and his city/county enablers.

Miami marlins are a horrible investment; will never succeed Mas family much better off with Beckham miami - only has to fill up weekend games. Only thing that changes my opinion is if miami gets amazon Hq2.

The Miami Marlins are a two time World Series Champion.

So much for you never succeed comment.

Great fan support and attendance during those successful years. Not so much in their lean years.

MLS soccer in Miami as an investment has already failed in the past as the Fusion went bankrupt and were contracted by MLS in the past.

Remind me not to take investment advice from you.

[Unregistered]

Sad that you know nothing about soccer and its history. For starters, since he's American and you may relate better to it, check out the Jay Demerit story. There is a complete documentary that you can watch, which played in select theaters when it first came out, so not sure how you missed it, unless you are new to soccer. Soccer is a global sport, mostly played by people with no means and there are countless stories like Brent Gardner, ones that had no high school to go to, not college to walk onto, no scholarship to be earned. Stop living in you bubble.

So a guy who played for the highly exclusive Chicago Fire Developmental Academy is your equivalent to BRETT Gardner?

Bless your heart.

[Unregistered]

What you said has been prophesied since I was a kid 40 years ago.

Demographics have greatly changed in my lifetime, but soccer has not in regards to popularity in the US.

Just as an example.

The awful, horrible MLB team, the Florida Marlins, sold for 1.2 BILLION DOLLARS recently.

The Seattle Sounders, the number 1 MLS franchise, are valued at $200+ Million by Forbes. That’s valuation only. We don’t know if they are really worth that.

Sorry, but MLS has a long way to go.

Seattle are not the #1 franchise anymore, that would be Toronto, Atlanta, NYCFC, LAFC and the LA Galaxy, with many more big money clubs coming down the line. The last franchise fees, not including stadiums, team, brand, etc.. was $150 million, so no, $200 million valuation may have been 5 years ago. The top MLS clubs are valued at over half a billion dollars now. Also, the rate of valuation increase is faster than any other league or sport in the world. I say the top clubs will be worth over 1 billion dollars by 2024 and then go up even more after we host the World Cup in 2026. By then Baseball, football and basketball will be losing their valuation and viewership to MLS soccer. You also have to understand that Soccer is a truly global sport with billions of viewer, unlike baseball, football and to a lesser extent basketball. When MLS is on the level of EPL, Bundesliga, La Liga, Serie A, the American other sports will not be able to compete in terms of valuation, but they will try.

[Unregistered]

So a guy who played for the highly exclusive Chicago Fire Developmental Academy is your equivalent to BRETT Gardner?

Bless your heart.

Again, you sound naive. You clearly don't know his story. Why don't you study up on it and get back to me.

[Unregistered]

The Miami Marlins are a two time World Series Champion.

So much for you never succeed comment.

Great fan support and attendance during those successful years. Not so much in their lean years.

MLS soccer in Miami as an investment has already failed in the past as the Fusion went bankrupt and were contracted by MLS in the past.

Remind me not to take investment advice from you.

I am talking about financial success; not winning world series. the attendance numbers you mention - while never "great" or really even good - were all in the old stadium. in old stadium they could attract fans from broward. now they dont connect with broward.
miami alone as an area cannot support MLB. for MLB you have 81 home games. a good franchise will average 30k-40k per game of attendance. No way that happens in miami. you just dont have a large enough financial base AND you compete against the beach, concerts, bars, restaurants, etc. it just will not work in miami and it's a bad investment at $1.2B. MLS now is not what it was with fusion. if done right, you can attract 15,000+ fans on the weekend, more if they become an event. they dont need to get 30-40k per game for 81 games. Salaries in MLS are WELL BELOW MLB salaries, so costs are within reason. I think MLS Miami is a much better investment than miami marlins.

[Unregistered]

So a guy who played for the highly exclusive Chicago Fire Developmental Academy is your equivalent to BRETT Gardner?

Bless your heart.

There was no development academy back when Jay played. Soccer was barely on the radar and not nearly as popular as it is now. If you played in a different country, those people did not respect you, without even looking at you. Much harder to do what Jay Demerrit did than Brent Gardner, or any player during that time then or before that played soccer in another country, the equivalent of getting to the Yankees.

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Again, you sound naive. You clearly don't know his story. Why don't you study up on it and get back to me.

Nothing naive about being his being a part of the MLS Chicago Fire Developmental Academy.

I asked for an example who was not from the elite world of travel, ECNL, DA soccer.

You comprehended that to give me an example of a guy who was very much a part of that DA world.

For goodness sakes, Beasley was a teammate of his in the Chicago Fire DA system.

[Unregistered]

There was no development academy back when Jay played. Soccer was barely on the radar and not nearly as popular as it is now. If you played in a different country, those people did not respect you, without even looking at you. Much harder to do what Jay Demerrit did than Brent Gardner, or any player during that time then or before that played soccer in another country, the equivalent of getting to the Yankees.

I would say that the Jackie Robinson story was more inspiring that Brent Gardner and more like the Jay Demerit story. Brent did not have to go up against what Jackie or Jay had to. Much easier for him.

[Unregistered]

Nothing naive about being his being a part of the MLS Chicago Fire Developmental Academy.

I asked for an example who was not from the elite world of travel, ECNL, DA soccer.

You comprehended that to give me an example of a guy who was very much a part of that DA world.

For goodness sakes, Beasley was a teammate of his in the Chicago Fire DA system.

For gods sake, there was no DA back then. Are you stupid?

[Unregistered]

There was no development academy back when Jay played. Soccer was barely on the radar and not nearly as popular as it is now. If you played in a different country, those people did not respect you, without even looking at you. Much harder to do what Jay Demerrit did than Brent Gardner, or any player during that time then or before that played soccer in another country, the equivalent of getting to the Yankees.

You are right. The DA didn’t start until 2007. Jay was a part of the Professional Soccer MLS Chicago Fire Developmental Team. Big difference between MLS Chicago Fire Developmental Team and the MLS Chicago Fire Developmental Academy. LMAO!!!

[Unregistered]

I would say that the Jackie Robinson story was more inspiring that Brent Gardner and more like the Jay Demerit story. Brent did not have to go up against what Jackie or Jay had to. Much easier for him.

First off, his name is Brett.

Makes $13,000,000 a year for the Yankees. Never was a part of any elite level travel team.

Jay was a part of an elite professional MLS soccer team’s Developmental Team in the Chicago Fire.

I must have missed it in the movie Rise, so Jay was discriminated against, denied US Constitutional Civil Rights just like Jackie Robinson. He received death threats because of the color of his skin and had people close to him *****ed because of the color of his skin like Jackie did?

You went full retard.

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DeMerit was a three-sport high school athlete in Wisconsin, where he participated in basketball and track in addition to soccer. He attended Bay Port High School and graduated in 1998.

DeMerit played college soccer at the University of Illinois at Chicago, where he moved from playing forward to defender. While in college, DeMerit formed part of a defensive backline that helped lead the team into the NCAA playoffs in 2000. Although he played with Chicago Fire Premier, the development team of the Chicago Fire in the USL Premier Development League, he was not drafted or signed by any Major League Soccer clubs following graduation from college. After spending some time working as a bartender, DeMerit took the advice of a former European teammate and decided to take advantage of his European Union work status (due to his Danish grandfather) by moving to England in 2003 with only $1,800, in an attempt to find a club to play for. He started off playing in the ninth tier of English soccer for Southall, earning only £40 a week.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54S3FYrABOY