Thursday, July 24, 2008

All the star, all the time readings

Well, well, Don Garber refers to more journalists turning out for the All-Star events this year than ever before (over 300 credentialed). I, of course, am at home. Most of all, I'm sad I missed out on so much free food. (Last year's ESPN-hosted party had a chocolate fountain and three kinds of free beer).
Anyway, here are a few articles that caught my attention this morning.
Becks! With video.
Funny the didn't mention the game today, though. Probably not West Ham fans.
Ha, ha, ha! Cough, cough.
Shilton hears Beckham's footprints.
So who was in the white limo? Don Garber?
Martin! Martin is taking a break from changing baby nappies to write about soccer again. Actually, he's been multitasking on that for a while.
Hey, it's apparently safe these days to like soccer.
The league has started to worry about losing talent to clubs abroad who can pay more.



4 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Argu whatever story said there is a rumor of an ESPN all soccer channel? Another soccer channel in the US, how many games do these people think we can handle! Is the future ESPN the inspiration for AC during her Canales Corner?

L.B. said...

Hopefully Canales Corner will be a fixture of the future ESPN soccer channel if and when it comes to fruition.

As far as the All-Star Game goes, when is it going to be played here in LA again? Yeah, I know we're spoiled already with all the soccer that comes through here but that's one thing we haven't had here since, what, 2003?

Okay, well, I guess that wasn't too long ago but it certainly feels like it.

A.C. said...

I'm just glad the ASG is in Utah next year - perhaps a road trip is possible.

Anonymous said...

I hope an all soccer ESPN channel happens and hope that it isn't like ESPNU or one of those other oddball channels they have. If they can position it to be the legit ESPN3 it'd be a great thing. I'm guessing that channel would be contingent on them actually winning the rights to the premier league they desire.
At least then it'll open FSC up to showing Ligue 1 and maybe Eredivisie.

Oh and I love that story from the NBA. They ruined that league with the salary caps and the forced college stuff was the straw that broke the camel's back.
As someone there pointed out though, there really are only about 6 clubs in Euroleague and elsewhere who have the kind of money to buy top NBA talent and the whole 'struggling us economy' meme is a bit misleading. Currency exchange rate and economic strength aren't necessarily the same thing. The dollar has already been recovering lately.
The simple fact is the world has been multi-polar since the fall of the Berlin Wall. The whole 'the US is the only superpower!' line is a load. The EU GDP is comparable to the US and the Euro/dollar rates will likely be near to one another for the foreseeable future. So it stands to reason we will have to compete more heavily with them with things like sports stars.
MLS needs to learn that lesson and start raising the cap or else it will be left out in the dark. It's barely holding onto it's status as a sellers league and will soon become a 'bypassed all together' league if they keep being so stingy.