San Jose Bills Fan Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 MMA doesn't allow free and clear shots on a defenseless competitor either. It has tons of gratuitous violence, IMO. I can watch boxing and enjoy it in fact but I can't watch MMA. I know the guys are skilled but the skill to violence ratio is way out of whack IMO. It's not so different for me than it would be to watch two guys with baseball bats trying to kill each other. That requires skill too but not the kind I like to watch. JMO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
San Jose Bills Fan Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 I understand your point. However quality soccer in the US is about to get a boost in TV availability. http://sportsillustr...bc-tv-coverage/ Basically NBC airing every game of the upcoming English Premier League season. The next step is going to have to be getting quality professional soccer in the US. MLS is a joke. But hey, it's a start I didn't know this and this will test some of the theories of cause and effect. I'm very interested to see what kind of ratings EPL will get. And your suggestion that MLS has lukewarm ratings because it's a minor league makes sense for sure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bills!Win! Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 Taking football away from America is like taking hockey away from Canada. Riots would probably happen everywhere Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bbb Posted June 17, 2013 Author Share Posted June 17, 2013 I didn't know this and this will test some of the theories of cause and effect. I'm very interested to see what kind of ratings EPL will get. And your suggestion that MLS has lukewarm ratings because it's a minor league makes sense for sure. I don't think most of the country thinks it's a minor league. They, including me, figured it's the major league of a minor sport. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
San Jose Bills Fan Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 I don't think most of the country thinks it's a minor league. They, including me, figured it's the major league of a minor sport. Maybe. Regardless I'm wondering what the TV ratings in this country are for World Cup Soccer and whether that might give an indication of the ratings EPL will get. I hear occasional mentions of Manchester United, Manchester City, Arsenal, etc. around here. I wonder if the hundreds of thousands of people in this country who played youth soccer will watch EPL more than they watch MLS. And I wonder if sports fans in general will watch EPL. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bbb Posted June 17, 2013 Author Share Posted June 17, 2013 The ratings for EPL will be not even close to the ratings for the World Cup. Americans at least recognize that that is the biggest thing on Earth, other than the Olympics. Or maybe even bigger. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ganesh Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 I think the days of hugely popular team sports is drawing to an end. Sports seem to reflect the attitude of the larger society, and many studies (and my own observations) suggest that kids casually play less than they used to (the streets are empty of kids on their own wherever I go), are much more into their own world, fostered by technology, so that there is less impetus to join up in person with others. The people who get them out of the house playing soccer or lacrosse or hockey or baseball inevitable are the parents. Without the parents, I think most kids would be perfectly happy to hang around the house with their iPhones, their XBox and a Netflix stream, interacting via Twitter and Facebook. As these kids become parents, I wonder if they'll be dragging their children around to participate in team sports. It seems to me, and maybe you too, that the "sports" that most interest kids today are much more individualistic than team, whether its surfing, skateboarding, mountain biking, snowboarding, et al. And that they do much more on their own initiative than from adult encouragement. BTW, no surprise that we have a huge Latino immigrant population in Southern California, and naturally, soccer is the big sport in those communities. For years now, lots of really fine baseball fields have been more used for soccer than baseball. To the casual observer (me), it looks just like anywhere else in the US where kids play team sports: lots of moms and dads, aunts and uncles, etc. I have also noticed that as they get older, there are far, far fewer Latino kids playing soccer. My guess is that this is tracking the decline you see in interest in team sports by the American kids. A second BTW: a lot of kids playing high school football now come from immigrant Latino families. So, I guess to sum it up, my prediction is that all team sports are facing both a declining pool of American participants along with a concurrent decline in a fan base. I don't see them ever totally disappearing. But I think the days of the great "Mass Audience" are already passing away as has happened with the mass audience for individual television programs, entertainers popular across all sectors of the population, and the narrowing of the newspaper and magazine businesses from "general interest" to much more specific and exclusive readerships. As the Brad Pitt characters says in a recent movie, "If you live in America now, you're on your own." My only comment to your fair assessment is that a majority of the players coming to NFL or NBA are not those that are playing the weekend leisure games over your neighborhood ballpark (with the parents and aunts and uncles). The incoming players are predominantly from the inner-cities and/or labor/plantation-towns. The NFL or NBA is their lifeline. These are not the kids hanging around with their xbox and ipods. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ralph W. Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 I can't actually watch soccer on TV. I need to be at the game and drunk, Go RED BULLS! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bbb Posted June 17, 2013 Author Share Posted June 17, 2013 If soccer becomes our national obsession, I'm going to start drinking again! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tcali Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 football was done in buffalo 13 yrs ago. we just haven't accepted it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
widerightradio Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 'Hold Harmless Clause' A statement in a legal contract stating that an individual or organization is not liable for any injuries or damages caused to the individual signing the contract. An individual may be asked to sign a hold harmless agreement when undertaking an activity that involves risk for which the enabling entity does not want to be legally or financially responsible. For example, a sports league may include a hold harmless clause in its contracts to prevent its players from suing if they are injured in the course of participating in a football game. In this example, the hold harmless clause would ask the participant to accept all risks associated with the activity, including the risks of injury or death. You're absolutely right that this will (and I assume is) the cornerstone of preserving the NFL from a legal standpoint. Hold harmless clauses will not solve either the failure to disclose or make reasonable efforts to discover information that could have changed that person's mind or those who are not of the age of consent. The NFL has to continue to research injuries on a good faith basis. Even then, we may see the dissolution of football at the youth level. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CodeMonkey Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 (edited) I don't think most of the country thinks it's a minor league. They, including me, figured it's the major league of a minor sport. Minor sport? Don't get outside the US much I gather Actually calling the MLS a minor league is overstating the quality of the MLS in my opinion. And that clearly has to change if it is going to catch on in the US. The ratings for EPL will be not even close to the ratings for the World Cup. Americans at least recognize that that is the biggest thing on Earth, other than the Olympics. Or maybe even bigger. Agree completely. It has tons of gratuitous violence, IMO. I can watch boxing and enjoy it in fact but I can't watch MMA. I know the guys are skilled but the skill to violence ratio is way out of whack IMO. It's not so different for me than it would be to watch two guys with baseball bats trying to kill each other. That requires skill too but not the kind I like to watch. JMO. I don't think MMA has any gratuitous violence, it just is violence in a raw form. Boxing is as well, but just watered down. I can't watch very much of either. Boxing I generally find boring, and MMA is just guys brawling. The only link to Martial Arts in it is a few of the submission holds that they use. But, if one of the competitors becomes defenseless they stop the fight immediately. Which was my initial point. Edited June 17, 2013 by CodeMonkey Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gordio Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 Maybe. Regardless I'm wondering what the TV ratings in this country are for World Cup Soccer and whether that might give an indication of the ratings EPL will get. I hear occasional mentions of Manchester United, Manchester City, Arsenal, etc. around here. I wonder if the hundreds of thousands of people in this country who played youth soccer will watch EPL more than they watch MLS. And I wonder if sports fans in general will watch EPL. My 9 year old son is a pretty good athlete. He plays on 9U travel baseball team that is one of the best in the area & he also play on travel soccer & hockey. He also plays basketball in the winter. I have not let him play football to date. He asks me to play every summer. Some of his friends play. I told him no again this year. My wife is dead set against him playing football, of course she did not want him to play hockey either. His favorite sport is baseball & that is probably the sport he is best at also. I rarely miss any of his games(& believe me between the 4 sports he plays a ton). I got to be honest with you, out of all the sports he plays, I just dread watching the soccer games. They are so boring. All the other 3 sports he plays I really enjoy watching, the soccer it is rough. I just don't like the sport. I really can not see anytime where that sport ever becomes popular like the NFL is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CodeMonkey Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 My 9 year old son is a pretty good athlete. He plays on 9U travel baseball team that is one of the best in the area & he also play on travel soccer & hockey. He also plays basketball in the winter. I have not let him play football to date. He asks me to play every summer. Some of his friends play. I told him no again this year. My wife is dead set against him playing football, of course she did not want him to play hockey either. His favorite sport is baseball & that is probably the sport he is best at also. I rarely miss any of his games(& believe me between the 4 sports he plays a ton). I got to be honest with you, out of all the sports he plays, I just dread watching the soccer games. They are so boring. All the other 3 sports he plays I really enjoy watching, the soccer it is rough. I just don't like the sport. I really can not see anytime where that sport ever becomes popular like the NFL is. Everyone is different. For example I find baseball excruciatingly boring to watch at any level. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gordio Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 Everyone is different. For example I find baseball excruciatingly boring to watch at any level. I hear ya. I love watching him play baseball, especially when he is pitching. Nothing more then I would rather do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
San Jose Bills Fan Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 My 9 year old son is a pretty good athlete. He plays on 9U travel baseball team that is one of the best in the area & he also play on travel soccer & hockey. He also plays basketball in the winter. I have not let him play football to date. He asks me to play every summer. Some of his friends play. I told him no again this year. My wife is dead set against him playing football, of course she did not want him to play hockey either. His favorite sport is baseball & that is probably the sport he is best at also. I rarely miss any of his games(& believe me between the 4 sports he plays a ton). I got to be honest with you, out of all the sports he plays, I just dread watching the soccer games. They are so boring. All the other 3 sports he plays I really enjoy watching, the soccer it is rough. I just don't like the sport. I really can not see anytime where that sport ever becomes popular like the NFL is. Interesting take and in accord with my own feelings. Of course I didn't grow up with soccer but seriously (please don't condemn me here) when I was growing up, kicking was something girls did. You never kicked in a fight and kickball was a girl's game (or coed). This is a half-baked theory at best but I believe that there's something about American culture that's all about using the hands and not the feet. Just the reflections of a baby boomer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GaryPinC Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 Everyone is different. For example I find baseball excruciatingly boring to watch at any level. I'm with you on this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
26CornerBlitz Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 @FootballPost Lem Barney apologizes for saying football could be gone soon http://bit.ly/15cpGc5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. WEO Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 The history of violent activities shows that it moves down the socio-economic scale over time as the cost-benefit ratio changes. Warfare was once the pastime of the "nobility" but you don't see those chaps rushing into battle with a lance any longer. Boxing was once a preserve of the "better class," required at Oxford and Cambridge (not by accident were its rules codified by the Marquis of Queensbury and not Joe the Cockney). Over time, it too moved down scale. For most of the modern history of boxing, the largest ethnic group participating was usually the lowest one socio-economically at that time. As that group "moved on up to the East Side," it was replaced by a new impoverished group. Football, too, was once an upper class pastime, practiced first at Yale and other Ivies by the sons of the elite. They still have football teams and, I believe, boxing teams as well. But we don't look to them for first round NFL players very often or for the next heavyweight champion. The same has happened with white kids over the last 30 years, with fewer of them playing serious football. That's now happening with many black kids as more families become solidly middle class: they put there kids into other sports. My guess is that pro football as we like it is headed to becoming a niche sport. As to the hotbeds, the sport would be a whole lot thinner without Florida, Texas and California. But around LA more and more kids are not turning out to play. I can't believe that's not true of the South as well, though I have no data at hand. I do notice that the tough white guys from rough backgrounds seem to have been replaced by black guys with that sort of biography, just like happened with boxing over the last century. The NFL will survive just fine without the City of LA providing players. They have so far... A majority of the NFL players play the game because that is their lifeline. If there is no NFL they are stuck in the back-streets of cities neighborhoods doing illegal stuff and even get killed. I just simply don't see the NFL going away as long as it is an avenue for a lfie-changing event for these players. My only comment to your fair assessment is that a majority of the players coming to NFL or NBA are not those that are playing the weekend leisure games over your neighborhood ballpark (with the parents and aunts and uncles). The incoming players are predominantly from the inner-cities and/or labor/plantation-towns. NFL or death? "labor/plantation towns"?? Where do you live? I think 20 years is too soon unless something catastrophic happens. But football is not getting more popular. The trend is that fewer kids are playing nationwide and that is likely to continue. As they grow to adults it is likely that football will get less popular. And it is only popular in the US to begin with. However I don't think it will ever die completely so long as there are parents willing to let their kids play (Texas and Oklahoma for example where high school football is a religion). It will probably just drop behind some of the other sports. Also, I feel it is almost inevitable that the US catch up to the rest of the world when it comes to playing and being fans of soccer (real football). My prediction, FWIW, is that football (soccer) will eventually surpass tackle football for popularity in the US. For that to happen in 20 years, as I previously stated, seems unlikely without some big event happening. The NFL is getting more popular. There will be plenty of players to fill the rosters. Pro soccer has been around for several decades in the US and it still has no significant following. Showing English Premier games will change nothing, as has the World Cup telecasts. Soccer is a kid's participation sport and nothing more for the vast majority of Americans. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CodeMonkey Posted June 17, 2013 Share Posted June 17, 2013 I hear ya. I love watching him play baseball, especially when he is pitching. Nothing more then I would rather do. A sign of a good father The NFL is getting more popular. There will be plenty of players to fill the rosters. Pro soccer has been around for several decades in the US and it still has no significant following. Showing English Premier games will change nothing, as has the World Cup telecasts. Soccer is a kid's participation sport and nothing more for the vast majority of Americans. I agree that is how it is today. Not to say it will be that way in the future. I think it will change. Of course my crystal ball is not always accurate. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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