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

TEARING DOWN WALLS EDITION 

U.S.-Mexico Border near Tijuana. Chronicle photo by Chris Stewart.

Maybe it was the incoming summer humidity that weighed down the television signal from Tuesday’s Open Cup game, because it wasn’t on TV, not even here in New York, where one of the teams play. But that can‘t be right? Given the precipice MLS is teetering on, they’d have to want to televise every game, right, especially a game between the two largest media markets? Blame it on the weather, I guess. Maybe it was just a forgetful week in New York. Why else would the New York Red Bulls’ inaugural High School Cup only include teams from New Jersey? That would seem more apt a move for the New Jersey Red Bulls. Maybe their new Youth Academy Director will help work that out. More MLS mysteries with the week’s best work, after the jump…

Even though or maybe in spite of the fact there has been lackluster attendance so far this season, MLS is covering its financial bases. Ridge Mahoney introduces what might be the biggest money maker for MLS: Mexican soccer. Ok, so it’s not that simple, but MLS side project (or is it MLS that is the side project?) Soccer United Marketing (SUM) has a hand in most any soccer match played on American soil and is the central focus of this week’s best article. Actual investigation, albeit without too many words, but still!

SUM is making money for MLS when foreign national and club teams play in the U.S. If you haven’t noticed, these are the games that people actually attend. It’s a few degrees from Kevin Bacon, and unless we saw the actual numbers that they aren’t giving over it’s impossible to say, but it wouldn’t be impossible to say MLS is floating here, at least partially unable to swim alone. The one question Mahoney doesn’t address, though, is whether or not MLS could exist with out SUM’s cash flow. I wonder.

Soccer America magazine took Cinco de Mayo to heart this week, focusing several features on the Mexican and Latin influence in American soccer (and for the first time in a long time, Soccer America was proving its worth in the world of SI and ESPN). It’s no mystery that everything people lop into the word “Latino” is the great, untapped resource in American soccer, both for players and dollars (pesos?), but it’s still a mystery trying to figure out on how to fully capture and capitalize on it, the goal being to get MLS atmospheres to look like those when the Mexican National Team comes north. Two parts of this are, one, improving the game (developing youth) and, two, selling tickets. Another part has me a bit worried the commercialization of culture and the stereotypes that fall within that proposition are getting out of hand in the process.

Right now financial, political, and linguistic roadblocks are keeping the non-white-American involvement below expected levels. That’s a lot bigger than just soccer – notice the giant wall in the photo above. MLS might want to consider getting involved or at least supporting the immigrant community off the field as well as on. It could give much needed relief to my worries of commodification.

No one will argue MLS needs Latin support, but do Mexicans et al need MLS? That’s not so clear, as exhibited by the marginal fact that US citizens are returning to their parents’ and grandparents’ homelands to play professional soccer (and in front of real crowds!).

Mike Woitalla breezes past what is one of the biggest points for me when he writes, “Whereas interscholastic play in football, basketball and baseball provides pathways to higher levels for standouts in those sports, it generally doesn’t in American soccer.” Woitalla spends much of the article addressing the pay-to-play problem, and maybe he doesn’t think there is much to that last statement except to say it, but the fact that soccer isn’t considered in the same breadth scholastically as the more traditionally American sports, is huge for me.

I mean, why isn’t it? Why do private clubs rule the day? Why is college soccer almost an afterthought, even though many of our best players went to college at least for a spell? Sources from the Woitalla piece even address the fact that part of the reason they are involved in Latino youth soccer is to provide in the very least the possibility for college. Why not make college soccer stronger, by supporting it from the top down, attracting talent and giving back to individuals and communities in the form of education, which certainly is worth more than a lot of the MLS salaries that were released.

But what do I know? According to MLS senior vice president of marketing & communications Dan Courtemanche, everything is peachy. In no small part due to SUM. I wonder if SUM has fan club?

In other news…

I’m looking more and more correct when I questioned Kasey Keller’s ability to draw a crowd or be worth big money. Turns out, not even the relegated German club he has played so well for in the past thinks he is worth it. So he’s jobless without any big suitors. Hypothesizers have Keller becoming Salt Lake’s consolation prize for having the guts to make one of their players the team’s coach, thus freeing up some money. Welcome to the Real world.

Ireland and Equador announced their rosters for their May 23rd friendly at Giants Stadium. That’s a Wednesday night. How will the crowd compare to a Red Bulls match…

A lot of people East of the Atlantic are salty about American ownership in the EPL. Even… the Ecologist magazine? I wish this editorial was on-line, but alas it is not. I wish the first mention of one of my favorite magazines was positive, but I was shocked after reading this op-ed. Maybe the Ecologist could have positioned EPL’s English ownership as an endangered species in order for this to make any sense within the book. Instead it sounds like an off-hand rant a child who had his toy stolen. It’s antagonistically nationalistic, as if every homegrown owner has nothing but good will in mind, but too it’s a lament to the bygone days that aren’t coming back, and that I can kind of understand.

“It is no simple coincidence,” Hughes writes, “that the Yanks have started to colonise (sic) football since Roman Abramovic landed at Chelsea – if he wasn’t Putin’s man he’d have been banged up or poloniumed by now. To see the pesky Rusky using his bottomless pockets with the aim of building the greatest team in Europe must have stuck in the American craw.”

Hughes does have some valid concerns – winning at all cost may actually cost youth development - but it’s presented as the schtick that has long given finger-pointing environmentalists a bad name. A self-described Liverpool man, I guess we’ll have to wait and see if Hughes is still salty if and when the Reds bring home some trophies.

Other takes on the situation now that Man U has won a title under American ownership:

Associate Press

BBC

Next up, the elephant in the room. With the self-imposed USSF deadline looming, Bruce over at du Nord had some thoughts on Manchester United assistant Carlos Queiroz taking the MNT reigns from Bob Bradley. I agree with him – better Bob than Carlos – but no mention of Pekerman? Bruce’s gut tells him it’s Queiroz, but mine has that Argentinean burn, which is less nauseating than the Queiroz spice.

And lastly, the give and go, or should we say ‘the Hustle and Flow,’ finally allowed for Clint Dempsey to break through. Couldn’t have come at a better time.