Soccer Will Never Succeed in the United States

I have a different take on why Major League Soccer will never be popular in the United States and it has nothing to do with coaching, star power, or the fact that you cannot use your hands.

Soccer, as wonderful of a sport as it is, just is not designed for American television audiences. Soccer does not support the :30 second commercial format which has long dominated American television advertising. Soccer supports the sponsorship idea where companies sponsor an entire half of play or chunks of the half or a billboard some place within the soccer stadium.

The sponsor way of advertising is perfect for Europe where their television stations display long blocks of commercials and then long blocks of programming. European television audiences are used to watching commercials that last longer than :30 seconds or are shorter than :30 seconds.

In the United States, all of our commercial television programming is based around the :30 second commercial. This is particularly true for most of our sporting events. Both the National Football League and the National Basketball Association have incorporated the "commercial time-out" into the usual play of almost all of their games. This commercial time-out allows companies to place advertising between key moments of play when they suspect that a large audience is watching.

All of the money that the major television networks make comes from advertising. Therefore, it is in their best interest to encourage commercial time-outs during the play of any sporting event. Without real television coverage, coverage on one of the major networks, during a viable time-slot, most sporting events will fly under the radar.

The major networks will fight over broadcasting Major League Soccer, the same way they continually fight over broadcasting the National Football League, once Major League Soccer shows them that advertisers can make money by placing commercials between key moments during the game.

The chances of that becoming a reality are quite slim. One of the great things about soccer is that there are very few time-outs. The beauty of the game is predicated upon strategy. This makes soccer quite different from the two most popular American sports, basketball and football, where every single play can determine who wins or loses.

In soccer, movement is the key, from space to space, from goal to goal, from side to side. Soccer is truly a ballet and for anyone to mess that up by making the game friendlier for advertisers will diminish what makes soccer different and special.

That means, of course, that Major League Soccer will eventually disappear, like all of the soccer leagues before it. Sorry, soccer fans, that's just the way it is here in the States.