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Is ESPN biased against MLS & US National soccer?
During mid summer, sports in the USA are at its weakest. No football, no basketball, no hockey....all you see on TV is tons and tons of baseball. But many overlook that US soccer is here in addition to baseball. The soccer Gold Cup between USA and Mexico beat the NHL Finals and attracted attracted 41 % more television households in the United States than the Stanley Cup finals clincher . Heck it wasn't even posted on standard TV, but on the Fox Soccer Channel and Univision spanish channel. It is a disgrace that American TV...especially ESPN didn't even show our national soccer team come back and beat Mexico in a dramatic fashion. They are now ranked 11th in the world too. ESPN could have showed this game and reached a higher mainstream audience. The ratings were very good considering how very niche both channel stations are. But instead ESPN 1 & 2 showed poker, billiards, and baseball. Neither bothered showing the game! Anyone else thinks the same?
Public Comments
- I can't argue with what you say.
- I agree with you 100%. ESPN doesn't give a damn about soccer, they put it on ESPN2 and even then they don't show it that much. They show, what, one English premier league game a week during the season, and that's taped. Pretty pathetic. Sportscenter doesn't even have an announcer that understands soccer.
- I think they just see it as a kind of "no one cares" sport. Just like Hockey, if I remember correctly Hockey wasn't on any real channels this year either. I think it's true that for the most part Americans don't really care about soccer until the World Cup rolls around, however it's also kind of hard to care about something when you don't know it's going on. I didn't see any ads or anything for the Gold Cup, didn't hear a word about it until after it happened. I think more people would watch/care about it if they knew about it. I watched the USA/Mexico game earlier this year (2-0 USA - I think it was this year) and I enjoyed it, and I'm the farthest thing from a soccer fan. It is insane that they'd show Poker & Billiards instead of the Soccer game. I certainly don't see people getting more excited about Poker than Soccer. I'm with you on this.
- Amen brother. Amen. You are basically saying all that I feel about ESPN and the other networks. You don't know how sick I am of watching the US play in UNIVISION or Telefutura. Both of these channels are bias for Mexico. Even thought they are calling the US, "The team of everyone". I watched the Final between Mexico and the US in silence.
- I think everyone above me has said it best. I agree with you 120% ESPN and other mainstream sports channels should wake up from their slumber because soccer is growing in the U.S. Some claim that no one cares about soccer in the U.S, well when you don't give socce the publicity it deserves no one is gonna care.
- What sucked big time was while Sportscenter had a small segment with MLS and El Salvador highlights from over the weekend not a mention of the Gold Cup was mentioned except for the winning goal making it in the top 10 plays of the day. Another reason why I stopped watching Sports Center.
- Of course ESPN is not biased against soccer. Look the gold cup is shown on the spanish channels because they have those games under contract. And who cares what channel they are on if you get to watch them. Would you really want to watch all the gold cup games while Wynalda spouted his wisdom anyways? Why do you think ESPN put mls games on primetime Thursdays? It's to try to do something to get some people watching it. They tried on Saturdays and nobody watched so they are trying something different. Also, most of the times the US has friendlies those games show up on ESPN or ESPN2. I love soccer, but we have to face the fact that most Americas don't. If you want to see more soccer buy the direct kick MLS package. And, please, the Telefutura anouncers and Univision anouncers are not biased towards Mexico. Yes they go a little towards Mexico because that is their main audience, but open your ears (if you speak Spanish I guess) they really do a fair job...and a much better job than American anouncers--although to be fair american soccer anouncers are getting better. Point is...just be happy with whatever soccer you can see no matter the channel.
