In the aftermath of the World Cup,soccer has been an uncommonly hot topic in this country. ESPN experienced big ratings, as did Spanish-speaking Univision. The U.S. acquitted itself well in Brazil, and goalie Tim Howard became an overnight media sensation.
Now there’s talk of the sport’s growing popularity in the U.S. and of networks cashing in. “American sports fans want to watch the best of the best” is the way Jon Miller, NBC Sports president of programming, put it.
Not so fast, Jon.
Don’t count on huge ratings for the English Premier League and America’s own Major League Soccer quite yet. Be wary of a World Cup bubble and don’t confuse quadrennial nationalism with day-to-day soccer interest.
Tampa Bay may be a microcosm.
Recall that well into the 1970s, we were an up-and-coming market without a big-time sports franchise to call our own. By contemporary societal standards, we were identity-challenged.
We were all about spring training for baseball and hosting pre-season NFL games in the late 1960s and early ’70s. But nothing that really said “us” if you weren’t talking about the Cigar Bowl or jai alai.
That all changed in 1975.
That’s when the Tampa Bay market was finally granted a major sports franchise. And, no, it wasn’t the Buccaneers. It was the Tampa Bay Rowdies of the star-studded North American Soccer League.
Back then it was common to see crowds of 25,000 at Rowdies games at old Tampa Stadium. In fact, it was not unheard of to see 50,000 or more fans showing up for a particularly big game. One year (1980), the Rowdies-New York Cosmos game drew 54,000. Later that summer, 56,000 turned out for the Rowdies-California Surf game on the Fourth of July.
The popularity of the Rowdies, the accessibility of their players (including partying with their fans at “Boneshakers” in Hyde Park Village) and their “Kick in the Grass” mantra led to ever more regional exposure and the growth of myriad youth leagues. Soccer was taking off. A viable, profitable, generational future loomed.
That was then. This is what now looks like: The reconstituted Rowdies feel good if 4,000 show up at Al Lang Stadium in St. Petersburg.
The old NASL eventually folded. There were too many budget-busting contracts for fading, international super stars such as Pele and too many franchises that didn’t draw enough to keep the books black. And, more to the point, too many entrenched sports to realistically compete with long-term. The novelty–including the debut of penalty-kick “shoot outs”–had run its course.
Even hosting the World Cup in 1994–Orlando beat out Tampa for one of the nine venues–was not enough to sufficiently reinvigorate Americans’ interest in the favorite sport of the rest of the world.
No, soccer–known as fútbol to everybody else–will never be as popular as Jon Miller hopes it will be. The incumbent team sports–football, baseball, basketball, even hockey–are too embedded in the culture. Lacrosse is a more realistic competitor. There’s also tennis, golf and auto racing to further siphon off sponsor dollars.
Then there’s this. Soccer really needs to do something about that running clock, limited substitution, fake injuries and plethora of 1-0 games. That’s not a formula for either penetrating or expanding the culture of incumbent team sports in this country.
But, yeah, I still wax nostalgic for the Rowdies-Cosmos at Tampa Stadium, and I still miss “Boneshakers.”