The World Cup is over and while there is much fan fair about the increasing popularity of these games in increased ratings and interest in America I don't expect a shift in soccer's popularity now as unfortunately this great tournament is over. The very success and popularity of this event is exactly why American soccer leagues will never compete with the other sports leagues in this country.
A demographic change that is underway that will take some time will be the only thing that helps the real football supplant baseball and the NFL has the most popular sport in North America. No amount of MLS play involving teams from Portland to Tampa will ever rival excitement of World Cup play or even the Gold Cup that is played the summer before World Cup. Americans canon get a little excited following the World Cup because it has the best players from each country while the league in America currently is rated only the seven best soccer league in the world. It does seem this country loves its tournaments so maybe an annual Americas Cup featuring countries from Argentina to Canada is the best way to get soccer in the sports limelight. Soccer is by far a better sport than collision football that has a leg up in history but one of the reasons NFL football is way more popular is the way the sports industrial complex pushes this game in the nations secondary schools and universities. When high schools push the school atmosphere and pride onto the soccer ball as it does with football then major progress will be made in having soccer replace NFL football as the nations pastime as football passed baseball thanks to this method and along with television. Baseball has never been popular with attendance in the schools of America and I am surprised it even developed a major league. The stubbornness of people in this country into thinking this is a foreign sport not worthy of respect is being displaced by younger generations that have embraced this sport and a more world identity in contrast to the rotten generations before them. I would of loved to have seen more NASL games as a youth but the old assholes in charge and running the networks and the sports advertising departments never considered nor wanted to see this sport succeed because of their own prejudices and stereotypes on this beautiful game. There are still a bunch of haters out there ridiculing the game and concerned about the growing interest and I can't think of a better way of getting back at their ignorant asses than supporting our league here in America and making it more mainstream and common on television as it is every four years in the summer
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