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Sanna looks to celebrate goals, assists and faith in August

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 The good news is that here in America we aren't idiots. OK, we are, and can be, but about Ramadan and sports we aren't the guy who runs Lazio (Claudio Lotito) who said this last year -

"I respect religious freedom and the ways that it is expressed," Claudio Lotito told reporters after a meeting of Serie A officials in Milan. "But I try to prevent things that can slow down training and the playing of matches. I've never bought players that have this problem."

Jose Morinho pulled a player because he thought Muntari had lost fitness due to his observance of Ramadan. Which may be true, or it could have just been because it was the first match of the year.

What we here in Seattle know is that Sanna Nyassi will not be fully observant of Ramadan's Fasting, because he feels that it affected his performance last year. The psychological impact it had on Sanna is apparent.

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With today's disappointment by the US National Team I found myself embroiled in another conversation about how soccer will never succeed in this country. It was the same tired arguments from the 90s that hadn't been bothered to be updated. The idea that the sport isn't succeeding here should be gone.

It can, and has been succeeding.

Whether it is recording setting TV viewership on ABC/Univision (18 Million +), passing all but two games of the NBA Finals. Or record-setting viewership on ESPN (6 Million ++), the fact is that more Americans care now then ever before, and the trend is continually upwards in nature.

Whether it is attendance that is up for MLS 2010 (+10%), while MLB is down (-2%), the fact is that more people are paying attention to a league that is at best the 15th strongest in the world.

Twitter was recently dominated by the World Cup and talk from the United States. So many times during the World Cup the social networking site has collapsed due to traffic.

Soccer isn't struggling to succeed in North America, it is only struggling to get people stuck in the 20th century to recognize that times have changed, while they have stayed the same. There is a rapidly expanding soccer audience in America, and media companies can choose to ignore it, mock it or embrace it. The fact is that since the soccer audience is younger, more wealthy, more educated and more likely to have money to spend than audiences of other sports modern media companies aren't going to ignore it, nor will the mock it.

We will continue to grow.

Sunday another soccer stadium will open. Just outside of Philly they will find out that 18,500 isn't big enough to hold the passion. TV Ratings in Seattle will be strong. And the soccer hater wll be an reminder of what sports radio was in its first two decades.

But it isn't.

It strikes me as funny that a radio station that I have so frequently praised for their respect to the sport turns around and gives a program to a man who feels an entire show should be dedicated to this absurd meme. Even funnier, this isn't one of the older hosts, but a younger man. Brian Abker is in the generation that has fueled the surge in soccer love in the United States. That surge has led the World Cup to get ratings exceeding the NBA and NHL.

Maybe he's desperate for afternoon ratings.

Or maybe he just doesn't fit the soccer demographics that the Seattle Times highlighted as part of their series on soccer mad Seattle.

Except that if he was desperate for ratings, and typical advertising he would talk about soccer more, as a fan.

You see Seattle's soccer fans are smarter, younger, wealthier and more likely to travel the globe than the other two pro teams in the Seattle area.

While in the rest of the world soccer is the sport of tradition, here in the USA and Seattle soccer is the sport of Gen X and Gen Y as we enter our dominant buying years.

If his complaint is about diving, I would point out that every receiver in the NFL does it. If he uses the word flop I'd point out the NBA charging calls. If he points out referee gaffes, the easy response is Jim Joyce. Closing one's mind to an idea does not make you a good radio host.

There's a reason why nobody listens to Jim Rome anymore, copying him isn't the way to get ratings. Welcome to the 21st Century. It started a decade ago, but you can join any time.

With the news about Walter Jones (FieldGulls with all your news/reaction) retiring it started me thinking. Me thinking can get scary. In this case, I just started to disappoint myself.

You see Jones is certainly the greatest Seahawk of all time. He is also certainly the greatest offensive lineman of his era. But it gets even crazier he might be the greatest NFL player of all-time. He was the best at what he did. The League and its fans have a greater appreciation for the position due to Jones.

Jones isn't the only Seattle icon that will be calling it quits this year though. Ken Griffey Jr (The best AL player of the 90s) will be done at some point this year. He also is a Seattle icon. If you think Mariners there are only two names that come to mind. Edgar and the Kid.

In all three cases the players started their careers with a Seattle team, and all three will end with Seattle as well.

But in Major League Soccer we have unique challenges. It is a league where good and great players move on to leagues in Europe. Average players rarely become icons. Landon Donovan, DeRo, Twellman, and Moreno are icons. But none are in Seattle. Keller is famous, but his stature has nothing to do with his time in Seattle.

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So, Match Day One 2010 is tomorrow night, on a Thursday. It is First Kick for the entire league again. But on the fairly rare weeknight games I wonder how people pre-game?

 I'm also asking this just to let you know that I will be pre-gaming at Elysian Fields, as I often do. I should have my sign, likely the Golden Scarf so you can find me, and ideally the staff will know where I am. If I can get enough people we may have our own space.

I found out that the League itself will be using the Elysian during the day, and for some pre-gaming as well.

ECS will be at Fuel and McCoy's Firehouse

GFC will be at Fado

NES will be at Swannies (IIRC)

Some people will find little tailgating niches, others will just work late.

How do you attack a weeknight match?

Steve Zakuani's life has taken him from the Congo, to London, to Akron and Seattle. Through that time he focused on soccer as his future. An accident had that dream stopped at one point and his focus shifted to life learning. His dream of a pro career in England stopped. But, as he returned to health, he discovered this strange thing called an athletic scholarship to a university in America. On his website he calls those two years at the University of Akron "One of the best periods in Steve Zakuani’s life. "

Zakuani is starting with a small foundation, running camps, having a scholarship, but his vision is large for Kingdom-Hope. While it will begin in Seattle, in the end he hopes to connect three continents and not just improve some people's chances at soccer, but with life education and academic work.

Below is our conversation about education, opportunity and soccer. He talks about how a program can start small and grow in ways like a player's development. It is a conversation about having dreams both on the pitch and beyond the touchline.

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To Whom it May Concern,

The United States has hosted the Winter Olympics on four occasions at three sites. Two of those sites the people of NBC have determined don't deserve to see the Olympics live on NBC. Neither Utah, nor California will be able to get live results on television in the USA, two states with HUGE Olympic history are being ignored by a programming decision.

I live in Seattle, and though I could drive to British Columbia and get the results in just over two hours if I want to watch it on television at home I will be forced to wait three hours, because some one decided that no one in Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Oakland, Sacramento, Los Angeles, San Diego, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Denver, Salt Lake City would actually want to watch a sporting event live.

We are no longer stuck in the 80s, when ABC made the mistake of tape delaying Monday Night Football, you have sadly chosen to copy that strategy in an era of email, internet, twitter and facebook. On twitter feeds that I followed I had a 3 hour advance notice of the Opening Ceremony. I knew everything that would happen, so I chose to ignore what you had on the television, there was no point.

Today, a Saturday, I am home with a dog and wishing that I could watch live sports programs, and I can. But only if I don't care about the Winter Olympics just a few hours North of me. I can watch Fox Soccer Channel and see the world's best soccer teams compete - LIVE. I can watch BBC America and watch 6 Nations Rugby - LIVE. There are a dozen stations showing college basketball - LIVE.

But the first medal of the 2010 Games I will not get to see live, nor the second, nor the third. I will be made to wait, because NBC/Universal seems to have decided that nearly 100 Million Americans don't know what the Internet is, nor do they have friends/family in the East.

You are making a mistake, and it is one that could easily be corrected. Sports TV ratings are up in 2009, and will likely be up in 2010. The reason is because of surprise, and that by being LIVE they are events that can not be missed. This year, I can afford to miss them, because I will already know the results, for unlike your decision makers I live in the 21st Century.

Thank you,

With the recent news that Jose Romero is leaving the Seattle Times, the rumors concerning Arlo White joining the Sounders broadcast, latest release of the Face of Sports (US)by Nielson and the nearly constant complaints on soccer forums about local sportsradio's lack of coverage of the Sounders I thought I should share my thoughts on this in just one place.

For a little background I have some education in Broadcast Communications, leveraged that into a job at KJR-AM Seattle for about 2.5 years, and even taught a little bit at BCC. The job I did at KJR-AM was as a producer - which means I was responsible at that time for booking guests, doing show research, screening phone calls and helping guide the overall direction of the show.

In order of amount of time I worked on shows I was affiliated with the following programs on a dedicated basis;
Locked on Sports with David Locke (now in Salt Lake City as play-by-play for Utah Jazz)
John Clayton's Sports Saturday (now at 710 ESPN Seattle)
SuperSonics Basketball (now dead and gone)
Storm Basketball
Baseball's Best Postgame Show(numerous hosts - Seth Everett, David Locke, Bill Krueger, Mike Blowers, Steve Sandmeyer, Dick Fain and Shannon Drayer)
The 4th Quarter with Dick Fain (now called Sports Saturday)
Mitch in the Morning

On top of that I worked and supported the other shows on the air, went to numerous press conferences and team practices.

I give this partial resume not because Dave Clark wanted to talk about himself, but so that newer readers might k now that when I talk about radio talkshows I know a little bit about it. It was my job, and while the host is the primary driver of ratings, my time was well spent.

During my time there I received constant calls that we didn't talk enough about sport/issue X, Y and Z. Every time I took that phone call or email I had to think "Is this complaint legit?" "If we talk about this we gain how many listeners and lose how many more/less?"

I was an advocate for more coverage of the A-League Sounders and that coverage very rarely happened, and was generally confined to on-air ribbing of the slightly crazy producer (me). Callers tended to advocate for more NHL talk, maybe some NASCAR as well.

We didn't have a hard rule. There was not a magic number that needed to be hit.

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