This Is American Soccer, US Soccer, MNT, WNT, and MLS - Tackling the subject of Soccer in the US, and worldwide.

We need better, more organized, more consuming soccer fans. What was it Bruce Arena said at that press conference in New England a year or so ago? Oh yeah, that – almost exactly. So what to do? Each and every one of us has something to offer. Old friends of mine I hope to drag over to TIAS some day, Pete Santora and Odiaka Gonzalez, joined onto to The Blue Sombrero and Sports4Kids respectively, two very different organizations that help kids find their games, be it for club soccer (Blue Sombrero) or public schools without physical education (Sports4Kids).

For something to go beyond sport and work its way into the fabric of our lives, there needs to be participation on all levels: in the game, on the sidelines, outside the game. Gaps need to be filled, whether on a roster, in the stadium, or in the marketplace. Last year, I invited the editors at Yanks Abroad - talk about filling a gap - to come and share their story, and now I have another guest.

What began with a t-shirt company called Bumpy Pitch that wetted the appetites of some friends has now moved into a much more adventurous hunger. Ben Hooper and his colleagues have recently launched a new site, evenison.com, that may be the most comprehensive I’ve seen. Time will tell how it plays out, but a good start is theirs. Their manifesto is after the jump.

We are experiencing a great time for soccer in the US. We are developing better and better players, MLS continues to grow, new TV rights are in place and the sport has never been as popular. As the product continues to get better on the field, we need to grow it off the field as well. Our love and involvement with the sport doesn’t stop when we take off our boots or walk off the pitch. It carries over into everything we do and into all aspects of our life. This is why we created evenison.com.

Five years ago you would hardly see anyone with a soccer jersey on. Now you see numerous people everyday sporting jerseys of teams around the world. A few World Cups back, it would be tough to strike up a conversation with anyone on the street about soccer that would be worth having. This World Cup, bars and restaurants were packed with people watching matches and talking about goals, players, and how the games were playing out.

The fact is that you know a fellow soccer player or supporter in minutes. Soccer people talk and act a certain way that sets us apart from other sports. The passion behind the game is so much more intense than any other sport. For the first time ever people here in the United States are not only beginning to see this difference, they are embracing it. They follow their favorite clubs; they hit the message boards obsessively; they travel abroad to see games, and most of all they want to know more and more about the soccer culture.

As passionate players and supporters of the game, we wanted to create a site to showcase and celebrate the lifestyle and culture that we live. Our site is a mix of what is taking place on the field, but focuses on how soccer influences all of our lives. The site is a mix of the sport, interviews, videos, music, fashion and so much more, all things that are a part of all of our lives in a big way. Evenison.com is meant to be fun and the more everyone participates, the more our culture will be defined.

Soccer in America is unique, and everyone involved with the sport here has their own swagger and style. For a long time people have been saying that the United States is the sleeping giant in the soccer world. We think that this country isn’t sleeping anymore, people throughout the country have embraced the game and live it everyday. We have created a place for people to go that will allow them to celebrate the essence of soccer culture on and off the field.

As for the name itself, evenison, or spelled out properly “even is on,” is a reference to the off-sides rule where if you are even with the last defender you are onside. We wanted to use that because we liked the name, but also as a reference to where we will always keep our readers “on” or up to date with the latest. We’’ take that idea to everything revolving around soccer, and its culture and lifestyle. We offer daily news to keep everyone up to date with what the main stories are, but we also want it to be fun and interactive for the readers. We want to give people another viewpoint on the game, more than what takes place on the field. We want all soccer people to be proud of and embrace their soccer culture. We hope that we can give them a glimpse into this world that maybe they hadn’t seen before, while at the same time keeping it fresh and fun.

-Ben Hooper

Share your participation in the soccer community, be it personal or professional, here. You just may see it on This Is American Soccer.