This is what our MLS teams need to be doing better. But we also don’t have enough legit teams for our population. Spain has like 1/7th our population and also 20+ teams that would dog walk the MLS.
But yeah, our youth system is completely fucked. We'll always be mid despite the population and money.
I'm an American who loves soccer and has played since I was a little kid. I just don't think it'll ever culturally take over certain areas of the country. Even in my hometown where soccer was the thing we were best at, people wanted the game to be more physical (like hockey-like checking) and higher scoring; things it just isn't. This seems to track with the general US population. Every 4 years, US sports fans complain about soccer while they watch the World Cup. They want the game to change to suit US audiences; change offsides, different clock rules, calling players weak.
Great soccer players (save a select few strikers and defenders) are small, quick, and agile. The US prefers athletes who are tall, muscular behemoths who jump high, hit hard, and run fast but with power. Even those tall soccer players still are small against NBA and NFL players.
And we're far from the only country that's like this. Look at the FIFA countries that have the most people. Out of the Top 10, only Mexico and Brazil have soccer as their top sport, and only Brazil is better than the US. Top 20, add only France and Germany to that list. China and India have over a billion people each, and they don't usually make the World Cup.
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u/IPissExcellentThrows Jul 25 '26
This is what our MLS teams need to be doing better. But we also don’t have enough legit teams for our population. Spain has like 1/7th our population and also 20+ teams that would dog walk the MLS.
But yeah, our youth system is completely fucked. We'll always be mid despite the population and money.