RE: Is soccer gaining ground in America?

The short answer? No.

I think it would be a mistake for the MLS to make significant rules changes to try to increase scoring. Doing so would only alienate the fans they have, and wouldn't likely attract many new fans, at least not fans who would stick around. I think soccer is just not going to make it big in the States, unless one of the other major sports takes a huge nosedive, and the way the MLB seems to be going strong despite the steroids problem seems to indicate that it may not be possible for one of the "big three" sports to fall out of favor without some kind of extended strike. Their best hope may be to become a second tier sport like hockey or golf. (I omit NASCAR since it is probably "first tier" due to the size of its following, but mostly because it is not a sport.)

A better way to grow soccer fandom in the US would be to try to get a few star players that are identifiable to the casual sports fan. Beckham has played so little that he's not done the MLS much good, and besides, I think it's important to get some homegrown talent to stay in the US to play. Any American players who are any good go overseas to play. (As an aside, it's somewhat surprising to me that there are so few good American soccer players, since it seems like everyone, boy or girl, plays soccer as a kid. I guess most just give it up once they hit their teens.)

It'll be interesting to see if the added coverage the MLS, and soccer in general, is receiving from ESPN will boost interest. If there's more news out there about it, and if people start to learn the names of players, and even teams (I'd be hard-pressed to name more than two or three), that might get them interested in following the sport more. I would consider myself a casual soccer fan (for an American), and I only watch maybe 2-3 games a year. I think I would be inclined to watch more if soccer got more than 10 seconds of coverage on Sports Center. Learning more about the intricacies of the sport would also help. ESPN's halftime and postgame coverage was pretty good at going into some depth with the game. I'd like to see more on strategy and tactics (but please, not the way NFL Live uses old has-beens running around a quarter-sized football field in suits to explain strategy!). I hear all the time that some teams rely on athleticism, while others take a "technical approach", and I have no idea what that's supposed to mean!

I think it would also be a good idea to get rid of ties. I think the MLS should go with a single overtime, followed by a shootout. They could give partial points (say, the same as for a tie) to teams that lose in the overtime or the shootout, as opposed to losing in regulation. Shootouts are fun to watch, but it seems like a crappy way to lose since they're really based more on lucky guesses by the goalkeeper than by skill. It's kind of like deciding a baseball game with a home run derby. It'd be fun to watch, but doesn't necessarily prove which was the better team.

I don't watch a lot of soccer myself, but recently I watched several of the Euro Cup 2008 games and a couple of MLS games, and the talent difference really is noticeable. I wouldn't have expected, as someone who doesn't watch soccer regularly, that I could have told any difference, but even to me it was quite apparent. I don't know if it's field dimensions or talent level or what, but the MLS players didn't seem capable of controlling the ball the way the European teams could. Passing was poorer and the ball changed possession a lot more in the MLS game than the Euro game, making the MLS game seem like amateur hour. It was just not as entertaining to watch. And there's just something about the MLS players that makes them look less... professional. In one MLS game I caught, one team had an overweight, 40+ year old guy on their side, and the sad part was, he seemed to be one of the team's better players!

Perhaps the best way to get Americans into soccer would be this: fantasy soccer! Maybe this exists and I don't know about it, but I think it could work. You'd have to go with more stats than goals and assists, but there's a lot more statistics kept for soccer than I previously realized, including touches, distance dribbled, passing, etc. With a little bit of creativity, fantasy soccer could be a pretty fun thing to play, and would definitely help people learn who the players are.