Comments on: David Beckham: Coming soon to a store near you!

By: Brad Barnett

Brad Barnett — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 18:59:36 +0000

Americans enjoy games that we either created or perfected. Baseball and Basketball for obvious reasons, American Football is the nations number 1 sport, and no one else in the world cares about it. Unfortunately the majority of the US do not like change, or something that we are not “world class” in, such as soccer. It’s a foreign game to the masses, and Beckham has the ability to make it more mainstream. It will never top baseball, basketball or American Football, however it has surpassed hockey and will continue to grow. But it will cap out eventually. Good Luck DB and the MLS, I’m excited to watch more of the beautiful game on TV.

By: TyLeR Schmidt

TyLeR Schmidt — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 20:32:56 +0000

I agre with Brian Lomax soccer will never be the main sport of the US but beckham could definetly help put it in the top 4. What is wrong with america is they dont understand the game.

By: Brian Lomax

Brian Lomax — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 19:42:42 +0000

No biggie Keith, I like that fact that we all have a place to come and talk about the beautiful game.

By: Jade

Jade — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 19:36:25 +0000

Good God! I just noticed how many typos I made in my comments

By: koolkeith13

koolkeith13 — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 17:19:20 +0000

Brian et. al,
Thanks for getting back to both Spurs and myself. Second, thanks to everyone who responded.

My comments were not worded right, but I am still trying to figure out how to put this: essentially I want to grow soccer (props to Jade for getting all academic) here in my city and in the States and I think that the existing community needs to be as inviting as we possibly can be. So, it’s with that in mind that I wrote the comments about the article. I think we need to be very careful about (and it’s hard to find the right word here) poking fun at the fringe crowd who admire soccer players for their celebrity. Yes, after reading the follow-ups I realize that Brian is writing about it because he has a genuine concern. He’s not trying to be malicious. So, Brian, I am sorry for misinterpreting your article. Keep up the good work.

Zamunda – I’m not here for just transfer news. I am here because I really desire to grow the soccer community in Seattle and the northwest states first and because I want to grow the community in the states overall. Sorry to repeat myself, but this is a big issue that I’ve been weighing lately: “How do we include more people into our community and make an envrionment where they will show up and want to return.” Also, I was born in 1982 so my first real soccer memories (other than playing all my life) were of World Cup 1994. I don’t have a frame of reference for the NASL, sorry.

dmiedzinski and Magic – You both made me realize that I didn’t articulate as well as I wanted to. Thanks for that. I think the bulk of my comments above apply to you as well.

Final Thought: Overall my message is that we need to be careful and inclusive in order for American soccer to be truly great. If we keep that in mind we will be there. We will.

See you pitchside gents!

By: Brian Lomax

Brian Lomax — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 15:42:47 +0000

Lee,

I don’t think “soccer” will ever become the main sport in the USA. Can it become one of the big four? Heck yes, and I look forward to that day.

By: Gavin Smith

Gavin Smith — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 14:24:58 +0000

srizzel, you’re complaining when the name of the site is called soccerlens.com – how ironic? Btw, there are many countries that call it soccer…

By: St George

St George — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 12:03:03 +0000

at the end of the day the MLS is an absoulute pile of shite, its mickey mouse football. Beck’s knows he had made a mistake but hes a loyal bloke so hes going to stick to his word and go to LA. However he will transform the league and attract bigger names to go over and play, but no matter how hard you try you can’t polish a turd. What a waste of a true England great.

By: Lee Pownall

Lee Pownall — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 10:32:45 +0000

There’s no doubt football will become the main sport in the USA one day wheher they like it or not!!

Beckham will do his bit towards that, I don’t know who the biggest sports person is in the USA at the moment. I think they are on a bit of a slump with sports stars at the moment. I think Becks has chose the right time, there’s only Tiger who I would say has world-wide superstar status at the moment. No big boxers, Basketballers, 100m sprinters, we’ll not like the old days (Tyson/Holyfield, Carl Lewis, Micheal Johnson) usure about NFL and baseball though.

In terms of marketing the MLS he’ll be good because just think people from other parts of the world if not the US will tune in to see how he’s doing.

Hopefully some other big players will join the band wagon, maybe Zidane, Carlos?

By: Jade

Jade — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 08:33:43 +0000

Soccer is an British term folks, stop hating “those damn yanks”, here are some copy pasted stuff off of Wikipedia for you to get a clearer picture:

The rules of football were codified in England by the Football Association in 1863, and the name association football was coined to distinguish the game from the other forms of football played at the time, specifically rugby football.

The term soccer first appeared in the 1880s as a slang abbreviation of Association football, credited to Charles Wreford-Brown, an Oxford student said to have been fond of shortened forms such as brekkers for breakfast and rugger for rugby football. During the late 19th century the word soccer tended to be used only at British independent schools; even in the UK, most people knew the game simply as football.

Football became more commonly known as soccer in certain English-speaking nations where the word “football” refers to a rival code of football, in most cases a derivate of rugby football, developed within that nation, specifically Australia, Canada, the United States, and parts of Ireland.

It’s not such a big deal, lets not make a deal every time someone uses it; we’re all talking about the same game here.