Why isn't football / soccer that popular in North America, United States / USA ?

[DeepJ]

It's far more popular in than american sports are in the UK.

My theory for a long time has been that americans only like sports theyre number one at. Football, baseball and basketbalk the united states is the class of the world at so we love them. Soccer we are middle of the pack at best and cant compete with the european elites, let alone the mid range european teams. Our soccer team cant even compete with Mexico, so it takes incentive away to enjoy the sport for so many people.

Very true, although the NFL, MLB and NBA are sports played exclusively in the north american continent at a professional level if i'm not mistaken, which of course makes it difficult for other countries to compete with the U.S. Also, americans tend to love only their own inventions (no offence ), even though the foundations to baseball were actually laid out by the British.

Americans enjoy action. No American wants to sit in front of their TV for four hours and watch foreigners kick around a ball on a massive field only to miss a net that is 15x larger than the person protecting it and the game ends 0-0.

A football match does not last 4 hours, it lasts 90 minutes. And having only a few goals in match makes them more appreciated and valuable.

 

[PlasmaTwa2]

Very true, although the NFL, MLB and NBA are sports played exclusively in the north american continent at a professional level if i'm not mistaken, which of course makes it difficult for other countries to compete with the U.S. Also, americans tend to love only their own inventions (no offence ), even though the foundations to baseball were actually laid out by the British.

Two problems with that, though:

1. High level professional baseball is played in Japan, and basketball is played professionally in Europe.
2. Basketball is Canadian.

 

[DeepJ]

Two problems with that, though:

1. High level professional baseball is played in Japan, and basketball is played professionally in Europe.
2. Basketball is Canadian.

Still makes it difficult for the countries that don't have professional leagues to compete. And most americans probably aren't aware that basketball is canadian. i'm pretty sure it isn't played professionally in Britain, not sure about the rest of Europe.

 

[Johan]

Very true, although the NFL, MLB and NBA are sports played exclusively in the north american continent at a professional level if i'm not mistaken, which of course makes it difficult for other countries to compete with the U.S. Also, americans tend to love only their own inventions (no offence ), even though the foundations to baseball were actually laid out by the British.

There are professional basketball leagues all over Europe and the top europeans team (Barcelone, Olimpiakos, Panathinaikos, CSKA Moscow) could do quite good in NBA, they could probably reach the play-offs

 

[sean miguel]

I don't think professional soccer will ever catch on in the U.S. There's simply not enough scoring. We're an instant gratification society.

We'll never go for a sport where a 1-0 score is considered a blowout and exhibition games are called "friendlies".

No offence soccer fans.


If the NHL hasn't gone mainstream, soccer certainly won't.

Here's another thing I noticed and maybe I'm totally off here but in soccer the really good players don't seem to stand out from the rest.
A casual observer can watch an NBA or NFL game and see that a player like LeBron James or Kevin Durant is exceptional or that Aaron Rodgers throws laser guided rocket passes but it seems harder to distinguish the talent in soccer.

 

[twat36975248664224]

Soccer isn't gonna be big in the U.S. because their isn't enough commercial breaks in the middle of the game. Think about how commercial breaks do baseball, basketball and football go through in a game?

Also some players act like pussy and flop.

 

[irishmax]

I don't think professional soccer will ever catch on in the U.S. There's simply not enough scoring. We're an instant gratification society.

We'll never go for a sport where a 1-0 score is considered a blowout and exhibition games are called "friendlies".

No offence soccer fans.


If the NHL hasn't gone mainstream, soccer certainly won't.

Here's another thing I noticed and maybe I'm totally off here but in soccer the really good players don't seem to stand out from the rest.
A casual observer can watch an NBA or NFL game and see that a player like LeBron James or Kevin Durant is exceptional or that Aaron Rodgers throws laser guided rocket passes but it seems harder to distinguish the talent in soccer.

Don't stand out you watch Barcelona best team in the world play anybody and tell me the best players don't stand out

 

[Mr_Stiffy]

I don't think professional soccer will ever catch on in the U.S. There's simply not enough scoring. We're an instant gratification society.

We'll never go for a sport where a 1-0 score is considered a blowout and exhibition games are called "friendlies".

Funnily enough, I came here to make the exact suggestion about the scoring.

I don't really know what you mean by "blowout," mind. 1-0 is a narrow win to anyone, and we mostly don't give a shit about friendlies.

I haven't been to a friendly since I was 10 and my lot just happened to be playing a friendly locally so my dad took me to see them because the local team happened to be his team. Friendlies are a no-win situation. I've seen my lot have some very embarrassing results in friendlies, but then if you win - for example we beat Roma 5-0 in pre-season in 2008 - you get about 2 seconds of "good score, that" then it kicks in that "it's only a friendly, it counts for fuck all." And true enough we started 08-09 like shite.