Compelling Soccer

Youth Served

-I checked out the opening game of the Under 20 World Cup yesterday, for no other reason than to see the future Soca Warriors go at it against Egypt's under 20 team. In theory your under 20 team doing well and making it this far, there are less teams in the Under 20 Cup than the actual World Cup, should be indicative of a bright future. It's not a moment too soon for Trinidad, who has gotten very old, very quickly and haven't found suitable replacements for the likes of Dwight Yorke, Stern John and Russell Latapy, or the quickly declining Dennis Lawrence.

Continuing my journey through the CONCACAF Champions league last night, I checked out the Mexican side Toluca face off against Marathon. Pre game anticipating was me wondering where Marathon was exactly. Greece would be a normal guess, but since Greece isn't part of CONCACAF, they could safely be removed. Turns out they're from Honduras. It also turns out it didn't matter, because stink smells the same no matter where you're from, Central America or a swamp. What do I mean? After seven Toluca goals, I don't know what else to say except my opinion of DC United just fell through the floor.

So I'm laying my cards on the table: Major League Soccer has never been my thing. As hinted at in my intro on Saturday, I've never been able to get past the fact that it wasn't the best, or the second best, or third best talent out there. At times, I might have been able to talk myself into it being the equivalent of the lower leagues in Europe, like Sweden, Denmark or Austria. But the fact remained that you are likely to find better play in English League One. And that's has been too large an obstacle to overcome, especially when I'd see a relatively slow, dull long ball style of soccer.

I'm not alone. Snobbery towards MLS is fast becoming the soccer tradition in this country. With a better product available now quite easily, it's quite simple to say "MLS sucks, so why bother with it when you can check out the Premiership?" And you know what? There's merit to the argument. If someone said they didn't want to watch minor league baseball because they found it vastly inferior to the majors, would we begrudge them? No more so than the people who stopped watching the XFL after two weeks because the game was more hype than substance.

On the other hand, MiLB has never sold itself as an authentic MLB experience. It's always tried to say it is something different with it's own unique charms. Unique charms aren't for everyone of course, but a niche can be profitable if embraced and handled correctly. MLS has in the past seemed reluctant to do than in the mainstream, going more for the XFL strategy outwardly of trying to bill itself as something more. It seems to try to pass itself off as the cool kid at the party when it just ends up looking like a poser. Not only do you have the occasional fan/league employee spouting off how it's on par with Europe, the league has long been populated with ideas to try to make it sound traditional "soccery". FC Dallas? FC stands for Football Club. You can call it Liverpool FC because in Liverpool, they call it football. Nobody in America calls it that. Who are you trying to impress by naming a team FC? If it were SC Dallas, then yeah, you'd be naming it Soccer Club Dallas, but it'd make more sense. Or DC United? What has been United? There only has been one club in DC. Or Real Salt Lake? Apposed to the non existent Athletico Salt Lake?

As pathetic as it is, I'd rather a team named New York Red Bull. Is tacky a company names a team after itself? Sure, though I suppose Robert Johnson and the Charlotte BOBcats would argue otherwise. However, the team is what it is naming wise. It comes off as stupid when you try to tap into a culture that isn't yours just to make it seem more official. You are a soccer team in America; if you embraced that, you might have more luck carving out an identity.

Ironically, they pretend with names, but skip out on the nuts and bolts. The season takes place off from the FIFA calendar, making transfers tougher. And of course, there's no promotion relegation, with the argument that the fan bases could not handle it. It's funny in a way, the concept of "success due to merit" is such an American ideal that the relegation system makes so much sense for us. Why should the bottom teams continue to get paid? Let someone more deserving come up. How can one of the most capitalistic societies in the world not have a relegation system anywhere? Alas, at least with the near future, it's not to be.

But as someone who has willfully participated in said snobbery, dismissing it outright for such injustices and faux pas probably isn't the right way to approach matters. Just as there's a place and purpose for minor league baseball, MLS exists for a reason. It isn't the highest quality, but soccer is still great to watch when it's played right. Getting over the names on the unis, the knowledge of the level of play; strip all of it away and do you have an entertaining product?