Tuesday, March 6, 2007

Pre-Damage Control

The US hasn't played here for years. Now, to the people who live out here it means something but to those who don't, well, it don't.

Now, I know if you look back at the history of the US, there have been a lot of games played out here in SoCal. But a lot of that was in the days before the soccer boom. Still, even over the last decade (as a poster points out) there a lot of games played out here on the West Coast. A lot of those games, though, are in San Jose or up in NoCal which is well out of the market. Heck, San Diego is out of the LA market. So those games don't really count as LA games at all.

But the games played in LA have been in steady decline over the last decade. Now, I think it's all well and good to take the game across the country but you can't ignore this market. It's one of the most important areas in the country. yes, the most popular team out here is El Tri but that shouldn't stop the U.S. from playing games here.

I've heard the arguments before about not playing here. Travel times from Europe are longer for games out here. A US game here would mean that the US would be booed and the opponent would be favored. We need to use weather to our advantage especially against Central American teams.

Whatever. The US happily scheduled the Mexico game in Arizona on a FIFA date knowing that the Euros would be called in, and Arizona is kinda nearby. They put supposed travel strain on players for a friendly. Interesting.

And aside from Mexico, the US won't see a 95-percent-for-them, 5-percent-for-us crowd in LA. I don't care who they play: Guatemala, El Salvador, Costa Rica, whoever. It's not gonna happen. And if it did, who cares? US circa 1993 maybe wouldn't have known how to handle a hostile crowd but you mean to tell me that players nowadays like Landon Donovan, Clint Dempsey or Oguchi Onyewu would be flustered because there are more Panamian fans than American fans at Home Depot Center? Are you kidding me?!?

One huge positive as well (and maybe I only see it as a positive because I'm in the media) is the amount of media coverage in L.A. Play a game in Alabama or play it in Columbus even and you won't get near as much media out as you would for a game in L.A.

Bottom line, it's a good thing the U.S. plays out here in meaningful games. And I'm happy it's happening sooner rather than later.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

You have games there every January.

L.B. said...

Yeah, cause that US-Norway game in January of 06 was so memorable. Let's see, Taylor Twellman was the revelation that day and it didn't matter because he didn't make the World Cup team.

Like I said, memorable.

Unknown said...

It's YOUR NATIONAL TEAM. The USA is the only country in the world where its "fans" discount the games it plays. People make up all kinds of excuses for why our national team games are not important enough to deserve their support.