I’m sorry, I’ve put up with this for years.  However, this soccer related elitism our friends from Britain (or who want to be from Britain) want to impose on us “Yanks” has got to stop.

I know it’s probably difficult to believe but there were fans of the sport in this country long before the 1994 World Cup.  Long before MLS was created.  I can’t go back to the NASL, though I’m sure there are plenty who can, but I wasn’t around for it.  Granted, most who followed soccer in the US in the late 80’s/early 90’s followed European or Latin American leagues but, there were plenty who fall into that category.  Remember when Soccer America was really the only source for information?

Around the time MLS showed up, the internet also became a part of our lives.  With the internet brought the ability to communicate world wide.  Suddenly, you could find the live score of just about any match world wide.  It sure beat having to wait a couple of weeks for my mother (still living in England at the time) to sent me newspaper clippings with news and match reports.  However, it also brought British opinion.

Now, don’t get me wrong.  My 13+ years spent in the UK were awesome.  I love England.  I love my friends over there.  However, I’m tired of Brits pointing out that what we do in the US is wrong because it’s different.

First, I will continue to refer to the sport as soccer.  I’m an American.  I currently live in the US.  That is the word we use for it.  I will consider calling it football once the United Kingdom decide that a lorry should be called a truck and that a lift should be called an elevator and that walk-about phone should be called a cordless phone and that…well, you get the idea.  Never mind the origin of the word soccer.  Fact is, we won a war over 200 years ago which gives us the right to call the sport of soccer by any name we chose.

Ok, so MLS is a Mickey Mouse league.  So what?  It’s our league.  It’s all we got and the supporters MLS clubs should be commended.  No, it’s no where near EPL quality.  No one has ever said it was.  When Alexi Lalas made the comment that MLS is more competitive than the EPL, he was right.  There is more competition in MLS because more than 4 clubs stand any chance of winning the title.  Most EPL clubs measure success as not finishing in the bottom three.  Honestly, how competitive is a league where you know 80% of the teams stand no chance of winning the title?

Yes, I’ve talked about Beckham far too much on my blog but just a quick mention.  I’ve been reminded to death by people from the UK that we (MLS fans) should be grateful for Beckham being here even if it is part time.  Sorry, I don’t buy it.   I won’t buy it.  Nor should you.  I don’t believe for a second that anyone would be happy if their star (well one of their stars) player decides to miss half the season because he would rather play for his country than his club.  No fans in England would stand for that.  Intentionally not making yourself available for half the season is unforgivable.  And to be honest, he looked a lot better in the two friendlies he play for LA than the league matches…even if you don’t count the Seattle match.  No, I’ve a feeling the English opinion here is rooted more in the hope that he could be their savior and bring them glory next Summer in South Africa than anything else.  As an American who supporters LA, I don’t give a damn about England’s chances.  I want LA to start winning again.  Besides, how desperate are the English having to put so much hope into a player who will be 35 next summer?

Ok, enough of that.

It’s not often I’ll quote a Frenchman but I think it fits even though I’m probably contradicting myself after asking those on that Island off the coast of France to shut up.

World Soccer Daily host, Steven Cohen created a bit of a fuss a few months ago but suggesting that had there not been a bunch of ticket-less fans milling around outside Hillsborough Stadium one day 20 years ago that all the other problems wouldn’t have happened which caused a snowball that lead to the tragic death of 96 Liverpool fans.  Of course, he embellished that statement by assuming there were beers being consumed by some in that group.  Still, it doesn’t sound all that bad.

Of course, back then it was common for fans to travel to matches in the hopes of getting in.  It was common.  Back then there were very few matches being shown on TV.  In order to see the match, you had to be there.  Teams were concerned that by having matches on TV people will just stay home and ticket sales would drop.  (I wish I had a link to that for you but I heard it from various sources back then.)  Of course, once Sky came along and offered more more than they were making off ticket sales, things changed and guess what, more people wanted tickets.  But I’m getting off track here.

Anyway, for some reason Liverpool fans took offense to the comment.  I’ve seen more than a few comments about gaining justice for the 96 (those killed) in relation to the campaign which was launched after Cohen’s comment.  I’m not sure how hounding World Soccer Daily’s sponsors is really providing any sort of justice for their death but, whatever.

The thing is, more and more people started to boycott the protest and for whatever reason–I don’t buy that they all pulled out just because of his comment–several sponsors left.  Things then picked up speed as accusations of threats went back and forth between Cohen and the protesters.  From what I heard, it got a bit silly…very silly.  Both sides got a little too worked up and it seems lines were crossed.  I don’t know the facts but the FBI is supposed to be involved.  Wow, what a waste of government resources but, well it’s their job.

Anyway, Cohen on Friday announced that because his step-daughters received threats via Facebook, that was enough and decided to end the show.

For me, I’ve never been a huge fan of Cohen’s…well, not his opinions.  But, he is a talk-show host and he does want to create discussion.  He’s always taken the ‘bad guy’ position on things going back to when he was on the air with Nick Geber.  I never really thought there was any malice in his opinions.  I actually don’t think he entirely believed some of his opinions.  But I don’t know this as a fact.

I supposed it would be right to disclose here that I know both Steven and Nick.  I first met them on July 4th 2001 outside the Rose Bowl when they were starting their first show.  I later did some guest hosting and some other stuff for them until I left LA in 2004.  It doesn’t make me an expert on Cohen and I haven’t had any real contact with him since leaving LA.

Here’s the thing which bugs me.  I’m willing to bet (a pint of Stella will do) that better than 90% of those involved in the protest didn’t listen to his show.  That had someone who runs an EPL focused blog out of Florida not done a second blog post about Cohen not apologizing for his comments, no one would be the wiser.  I actually don’t have a problem with his first post.  He has every right to disagree.  The second one was just trying to stir things up in my opinion.  No, I’m not going to link to the blog because, again my opinion, the whole thing was to create traffic to his blog.  Interesting that he hasn’t commented about Cohen stepping down on his blog yet.  Remorse?

The thing is, we had a national talk radio show which was focused on soccer.  EPL, MLS, La Liga…heck they’d talk about just about any league..though many they didn’t have a clue on.  But it was primarily EPL and MLS focused cuz that what the listeners wanted to talk about.  Ten years ago there wasn’t a talk radio show in the country which wouldn’t laugh at you if you called up wanting to talk about soccer.  Now, thanks to some know-it-alls we are back to square one.  Cohen created something which, though he probably could have handle things better, was brought down by people who have no clue what they did.  It’s unfortunate.  One day I’ll be able to drive around listen to someone on the radio talking about soccer again…but it may be a while.

Cohen will be back but with a subscription based show.  It won’t be on the air though which is the real shame.  One person (from Poland of all places) while pointing how how awful Cohen was informed me there were plenty of shows in Europe which were much better.  I responded by asking for advise on how to improve my car radio so I can get the broadcasts over here and get around the international tolls when calling in.  no response.

What’s even more amazing is how hypocritical those Liverpool fans are.  They are outraged by Cohen comments, but when their own sing about a tragic event which killed most of the Man U team, it’s ok?  I sure don’t see them going after those involved in this event.

I think what is most telling in all this was when that Florida blogger (mentioned earlier) was interviewed on NPR about Cohen said that he didn’t want Americans learning about Hillsborough from from him.  C’mon, how ignorant do you believe we are?

Let’s review:

• The sport is called Soccer and no amount of insults will change that
• Beckham is a waste and halfway through his contract with LA he has done nothing except taint his brand
• and while tragic, we’d rather have a radio show than care who did what at some match in Sheffield.

So much for Trans-Atlantic relations.   However, please take something from this if you are English and not happy with my words, there are a lot of American’s who do know a lot about the sport and who love it and their clubs every bit as much as you do.

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