Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - #705: A casual fan's take on the impact of the World Cup

Episode Date: June 29, 2026

Mike Guardabascio in southern California, of the Jenkins and Jonez podcast and one of the founders of of 562.org, joins Vince and Belz to talk about how the USMNT is hitting in Long Beach during this home-soil World Cup, what stands in the way of soccer becoming America's "thing," and other matters of that nature. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-jenkins-jonez-podcast/id1018701693 https://www.the562.org/ Skip the ads! Subscribe to Scuffed on Patreon and get all episodes ad-free, plus bonus episodes. Patrons at $5 a month or more also get access to Clip Notes, a video of key moments on the field we discuss on the show: https://www.patreon.com/scuffedCheck out our store, where you can get Scuffed hats and sweatshirts and other stuff: scuffedpodcast.com/storeAlso, check out Boots on the Ground, our USWNT-focused spinoff podcast headed up by Tara and Vince. They are cooking over there, you can listen here: https://boots-on-the-ground.simplecast.comAnd check out our MERCH, baby. We have better stuff than you might think: https://www.scuffedpodcast.com/store  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Welcome to the scuff podcast when we talk about U.S. soccer. Hey, everybody. It's Monday, June 29th. Two days out from the USA showdown with Bosnia and Herzegovina in Santa Clara. First of all, an announcement. I just found out that I will be in Santa Clara, California, for the match. So anybody that's pulling up, pull up to the A.O. Telgate American Outlaws, I will be partying with American Outlaws. Obviously, this happened on short. notice so we couldn't coordinate a full scuff thing. But, you know, partying with the,

with American outlaws has always been good to us. So I will be there. If it list to it, I will be there. I'm going to tweet this out, put it on Patreon, blue sky, whatever. So we'll get the word out. But I will be there, happy to be there. And it's going to be hard for people to pick you out of the crowd there. It'll be a little less hard in Cali, I think, I think. But we'll see. Matter of fact, somebody came up to me. me in Seattle. When I first walked into the brewery before the pregame,

Bells, somebody came out to me is like, you've got to be Vince. You know, I mean, there's a I was like, I was like, yeah, that's me. It is me. But we got a special guest today. I'm here with Bells.

First of all, you just heard Bells on here. They're a special guest. A man who runs a prep sports website in Long Beach, California. He's a sports guy, but a casual soccer fan in Cali. and the host of one of my favorite podcasts, The Jenkins and Jones Show, which I've been listening to,

I mean, since it's inception, literally. Like, since the very first episode on, I mean, I basically grew up on it. I remember back in, like, 2015, 2015? I graduated college in 2016. So this got me through my transition from college life into an adult, all these types of things that's a podcast about sports,

but mainly about life. you know, they get into everything. And so it's the host of the show, Mike Gardabasio, of the 562.org and the Jenkins & Jones show. Mike, how you doing, sir? I'm great, man. I really appreciate you guys having me on. It always scares me a little bit when people tell me they've been listening

to Jenkins and Jones in formative years. You know, it always ends up being good people that we like in real life, but I'm always like, I don't know if we were saying stuff people should have been listening to when they were 20 years old. bro but it was it was exactly what i what i needed at that point in time because it's almost like i mean not to get into the lore too much but the very first episode is like john and tyler talking about how they're never going to get married never have kids and they're both married hell now right right right in the see the evolution you know it's um that's life bro you know then just to have kind of

I have big brothers, but to have some more big brothers that I kind of listen to through you know, you form these parasycial relationships or whatever. You know how it goes. And I know how it goes now. I mean, meeting people that listen to the pod or whatever that helps them get through. Listening to your guys' pod, I know you guys have kind of a similar thing that we do where you've got a close relationship with a lot of your listeners and stuff. And that, I mean, to me, that's kind of one of the only redeeming things about the internet

is that ability to connect with people in that way. so for yeah for sure but i know you guys definitely get that with your with your you know your crowd as well like you just throw out there you know like when we are kids no one was doing that on a show you like like i'm gonna be partying over here before the game come say hi like you know what i mean that just would never have happened and i i do think as part of what's fun about the way we can all be sports fan and it ties into y'all being a soccer podcast too because that's how i mean it used to be like it was like a prohibition sport or something when I was young. I mean, it was it was like passed between people like that.

Everyone could tell you which person got them into soccer. Now my kids and their friends, it's just one of the, it's one of the main sports now, obviously. But back in the day, it felt like a very social thing because no one just like, it wasn't on TV in a convenient way. So you got pulled into it by somebody, you know, at least that's how it was, you know, back in the ancient 80s and 90s that I grew up in. So right. And, you know, we, like I said, in the intro, we wanted to have you on because you are the quintessential American soccer casual.

I noticed that this whole idea. This whole deal popped in my head. I think it was a 2022 World Cup, which obviously did not get the same spotlight that this one has being in the winter, kind of being overshadowed by other sports that were going on. But you mentioned in the passing, you were like, yeah, I messed with the U.S. national team a little bit. I got me a kit, you know, whatever. And so from then on, that just stuck in my mind. I was like, we got to get Mike on at some point. And no better time than now. Home World Cup. You know, we talk on this pod all the time about how we can bring more people into the tent,

how we can make more soccer sickos. I guess we'll get into our first question, Mike, as the casual, is this team capturing hearts and minds? Is this World Cup capturing hearts of minds? I think for sure. You know, I mean, I know, I'm sure you guys saw it all over social media, but, you know, I'm in Southern California. And a lot of people here were sort of talking on social media the couple weeks leading up to it about like it's crazy.

It doesn't feel like there's that much height. You know, it didn't feel like, I mean, for me, as someone, I do, you know, I am a soccer catchable, I love the World Cup. That's, it's just one of my favorite sporting events ever at any time of year. But it wasn't like constantly being talked about. But then the second it started, it was like, and I think, you know, that first big game being at SoFi in Southern California definitely helped. But yeah, I mean, I think it is, it's, I see so many people, like we have every place in Long Beach is hosting a watch party for every men's national team game. That certainly was not the case in the Cutter, you know, World Cup. And so I think they are.

I think it's been interesting as a long time men's national team casual that there's now expectations that like everyone I know is like we're going to beat the you guys cuss on here lightly not really no no okay okay people being like we're going to beat the heck out of Bosnia and I'm like what country are we from that we're like well obviously we're going to smash in a knockout round in the World Cup I was like we would love to hey but we made it to PKs like you know you just we weren't we weren't taking a lot of wins for granted i got everyone's like belgium's old you know the people that are just like marking us through and i'm like this is not belgium's old but i i do i mean i i feel it at least you know i'm sure you all see it with your numbers and stuff too but i i do feel like the viewership has has been crazy i know the numbers are crazy on all the ratings and stuff but I have a ton of people who it's the right time of year. Like, no one's tapped into Major League Baseball in that way, pre-all-star break.

Basketball is wrapped up. And it just, the time zones help. I know you guys have talked about that. The time zone thing helps a lot where you don't have to go to a bar at 1 o'clock in the morning to watch a game start. So, but yeah, I think it's definitely made a big impact for sure. What? So you said, you mentioned the game of SoFi. What kind of impact that I have?

Do you know people that went to the match? Oh, we knew a ton of people. I will say, you know, you guys are talking about the game against Turkey A being, you know, ending up being a friendly. I think one thing I haven't seen a lot of national media talk about is it was kind of lame. I don't really like the new format on the type, you know, I think. The tiebreakers? Yeah, you know, you lost some of the heat in that third round, you know, those. Absolutely.

the third double-play games, which to me is a bummer because it's just like the, I want as many meaningful World Cup games as possible, right? Like it's so long in between them. But I think one of the benefits of that from the, from specifically the perspective of the U.S. men's national team is there were so many people in Southern California who could suddenly kind of afford to go to that game once it just sort of became a friendly. And so I have a ton of friends. my wife is a teacher there's people at her school we know so many other teachers where it was like

well the the tickets for the for the first game in l.A. were $3,000. No one was going to that. But that shows you how big the demand was that it was truly like a like a Super Bowl. I mean, it really was priced at that level. But then all of a sudden for that Turkey A game where it was like, ah, we don't know how many of the main guys are playing. All of a sudden, you could get a ticket to that for three or four hundred dollars. And really people were, yeah, people were like snapping them up i mean it was like especially if you're going day of and you were looking for a deal but i we knew a ton of people who were kind of casual fans but who go and of course they're coming home with four scarfs they're coming home with you know all the gear and that memory

of oh i got to see a world cup um on home soil and i and so i think as much as i've criticized the format i do think there was in terms of just like fan accessibility in person there was a there was a benefit to that game having a little bit lower stakes maybe not Not necessarily the game they would have wanted to have the result they would have wanted to have seen, obviously. But, you know, it's just, I still couldn't afford to go. So I still haven't gotten to see them play, you know, in the U.S. in a World Cup. So, but yeah, I do, I think that it's made a big impact locally for sure. And I just think there's such a difference between it's on TV all the time versus you actually get to see one of those like big games, you know, not just a friendly or, you know, the North American.

stuff, but the, you know, the actual big games that people really care about. Yeah, on, on real prime time, not tucked away on peacock or whatever, over the air, lots, you know what I'm saying? Like in every household, you get an Obama digital antenna, boom. You want it. You know what I'm saying? So I guess I ask you this question. As a casual, like, what's your experience been as like seeing this generation kind of

I'm up. You know. Yeah. I mean, it's just been exciting, like, because I think it was always weird. And, you know, Vince, I know I'm, I'm a good chunk older than you, Bells. I don't know about you. But, you know, being a fan of this team, I mean, the results was not associated with the fandom.

I mean, it's, it's like if you're a fan of an MLB team whose owner doesn't want to spend money or something, it's like you're a fan of that team either because of your, relationship with your dad or the social experience or the tradition in your city or something like that, right? And that's very much for me what being a fan of the men's national team always was. It was just there was a certain group of friends that we would always go to the sports bar that had the big soccer watch party, regardless of what time of day it was. And that relationship, including the, ah, well, you know, maybe next time. Yeah, that's kind of what's. the experience was. And so I'll be honest, I was somewhat cynical as they started talking about

kind of the golden generation and stuff of like, this is not our thing. And I've already made my piece with that. Like, I'm, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm happy with where we're at. You got other sports. I mean, kind of, you know, like, and I do like, you know, I'm a bigger basketball fan than I am a soccer fan, but I don't care about like the Turkish men's basketball team. But I do, I care about these other countries and soccer because the storylines are so good and their, and their players are so good. So I was just kind of comfortable where things were. I was not really letting myself sort of go all in on the hype with the golden generation, everything. And then obviously I think you saw a Paraguay match. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But then like as they have, as, as we've,

I'm still trying to get used to like we were just talking about having. expectations in a World Cup and other people around me like you know people were like I had new people who were pissed about losing that game to Turkey pissed and I was like dude we won the group who can't like brother that there are people in our discord going crazy like I mean like the way they're talking about these performances and we have some bad performances don't get me wrong but it seems like people are like really sour you know and it's not going to heal until we until we hopefully beat Bosnia-Herzcovina on Wednesday, you know? Like, people are upset.

How do you guys feel about that game? Where's your stress level? I mean, do you have the bigger person? To me, like, once I saw the bracket, and you see the final standings in the group, it's like, that's the stuff to me that, like, when I was first getting into the team, we would just dream about stuff like that at a World Cup.

So for me, it was very easy to turn the page on, like, cool. Like, you know, we're into the knockout. We won the group. You know, we've looked great. I don't know. I wasn't that worried, but I did have a lot of friends. How do you guys personally feel? Are you easily on to the next part or you have some lingering doubts over the way that that last game ended?

Go ahead, Bill's. Well, I mean, it is hard to explain to people. Like, I'm tired of explaining this kind of stuff to people. Like, we didn't, we didn't play very well because we rotated nine of the 11 starters. And I mean, by the time, halfway through the sentence, people stop listening to me, you know? Yeah. So it's like, so I don't. I haven't, I've just been like, yeah, we get our second string isn't that good, isn't as good as our first string, that's a problem.

But hopefully got everybody back against Bosnia. My stress level for that game is high, you know, I've seen, I mean, that's a, that's a bunch of, like, hardened, balcan footballers who maybe they're not that good on paper, but they're going to give it everything they got. You know they will. And, you know, we've watched this men's national team piss away some things that it shouldn't have, you know, not too long ago. So I'm stressed, of course. Yeah. But I am also, and I do expect us to win at the same time. And I sort of half expect us to, like, put a hurting on them, you know?

Like, so it's complicated how I feel about it. But I'm like, nothing will shock me. Go ahead, Vince, you go ahead. I got some questions for Mike, though. Well, I don't feel stress, mostly. At this point, it's just like sports in general, like as much as I love the U.S. Mids and National Team.

At this point, the men's and women's national team is kind of like my life, almost, or a very 33% of my life. You know, I got my kids' wife. And then, you know, but, you know, in the other order there, brother. Yeah, for sure. But in the other pile, like, you know, these teams take up like everything else, like all the other space in my brain, you know.

But I do have a healthy relationship with sports now. Like it's just, you know, kind of a thing as you grow. You know, I'm 34 now. It's like when I took losses way harder when I was 22. And 34 is just like, you know, I have those other things to lean on. So I don't, I don't stress as much maybe when I'm in the stadium and the game kicks off. But also, I do kind of like this matchup with Bosnia and Herzegovina. They will be tough, but there is just like a clear talent ceiling that they're going to bump up against and that we should be able to handle our business and bungle our way through.

It might be ugly. It could be, especially if they set up in a low block. You know, we've had our issues against pacting defenses like that or whatever. Like that, that always sets up for a stressful time. you get to the, if we get to the fourth quarter at this point, and it's still nil-nil, that's going to hurt. You know, that's going to hurt. But I think we're going to take care of business.

And this is not looking past Bosnia and Herzegovina. Listeners of this pod note, I got a lot of love. Mike, you don't know this. There's a huge Bosnian diaspora in Louisville. Okay. Like I live like a mile away from a Bosnian mosque. And they're the coolest people ever. Yeah.

So I got respect for them that, like, one of the first soccer players I knew outside of, like, Mesei Renato was Eden Jeco because of my Bosnian friends. So I got respect for them, but I think they're going down, brother. And furthermore, I saw somebody say this in the Discord. It would be a catastrophe on the level of Kouva, on the level of not qualifying for the 2018 World Cup. And I kind of agree with that. Yeah, everything to lose, almost nothing to gain. But I think we got stuff to gain. I mean, when in a knockout game, do or die, you know, and we're back in prime time.

Yeah, I think that I take it back. We got plenty of the game. Yeah. The country's going to be tuned in. So, yeah, I'm feeling good, man. I have no, at this point, I have no reason to doubt this team, man. Like, the turkey match does not matter. If we play, if we have to depend on Brendan Aronson to win a knockout match, then,

unfortunately, the bug stops here, brother. So it's just, those were the before times, you know, like, that's, like, that's how I feel about it. No, no, no shade, no, no shade to Brenda. I know people. Yeah. So Mike, Mike, you said earlier, when you first heard about the Golden Generation, you were skeptical. You're like, this is just not really our thing.

Yeah. And I would say even now, it's true that soccer really isn't our thing as a nation yet. What would, I mean, you think about sports, you talk about sports all the time. What would get, like, how do we get to that point where soccer is our thing? I think it's a real like chickener that I've thought so much about this and we've talked so much about this. And it's it. We debate it as writers. I've talked with John and Tyler on Jenkins and Jones about it.

Like, you know, the big spotlight is always on the barrier of entry like cost wise. Right. Like that's people talk about that quite a bit. Some of that stuff, what I see at the youth level is, you know, that whole academy structure is it is starting to change that. There are, you know, in Long Beach, we have a ton of really talented athletes who come from, you know, a poorer background that, like, they are not playing elite club soccer that their parents have to spend five figures on. They're just not able to do that. But the galaxy, you know, the MLS structure is now to where they are identifying those kids at a younger age, which is more similar to the way that it is in Europe and other places and getting them into the pipeline. And so I'm hopeful that some of that, like, barrier of entry is disappearing.

So then the bigger thing to me is sort of the cultural thing. Like, NFL football is obviously, you know, college football, obviously the biggest things happening in America. NBA basketball, baseball, there's this long history. But I do think fundamentally, and I've always maintained this, there's a chicken or the egg around winning in this country. We care deeply about hockey when we are better than the rest of the game. of the world at hockey. Like you just saw that in the Olympics. This is not a hockey country,

but it can be a hockey country for a generation of kids. And that group that just won the Olympics for the USA hockey, they were that type of a golden generation that they grew up believing we're going to put America on top.

We're going through the youth ranks together. We're all entering the professional ranks together. But there's an off-season commitment. There's a year-round commitment to the national team that does not always exist when it's not the big cultural sport. And so to me, I think that, you know, it is just success. I think it's just success in the World Cup.

And as you guys said, like the pump is primed. It's like 150, 170 million people, whatever watching the games. If they're having success, if they're able to make a run, if we win one, if we win two, gasp, if we win three. You know, like, I just think, I just think. That's like in this country, we root for winners and we care about winning a lot. We care about winning a lot of stuff we don't care about. Like, I, you know, I was at a bar with people going crazy for curling in the winter

Olympics. No one here cares about curling. Like, you can't find a place to do that sport within 50 miles of where I live. But people were going crazy because we were beating another country at it. So I think like it's part of our cultural identity that it's not our sport. But I think that if people see that success, I think it's very easy to kind of flip that stuff around here. And that's part of what's so exciting about this World Cup to me is I just, I feel the real possibility is there. We're not sitting with our friends going, well, maybe if this happens or, you know, if it ends up nil, nil, you never know.

We're really talking about, you know, beating these teams. So I think, I do think the success is like everything here. in my opinion starts with that. If people see the success, then immediately things change. Okay. Yeah. Do you all agree with that?

Is that a crazy take? No, no, no. It's just one of those truths that are just self-evident. But we kind of don't want it to be necessarily because it's like that's... Because you can't guarantee it. Can't guarantee it, bro. And it's probably the furthest away thing of like, you know, the U.S. becoming one of those elite soccer nation.

Like, it's almost like we have... have to become an elite soccer nation on the field before we can culturally change it. And we're not going to until we can culturally change. Yeah. So the way I think about it is. The way I think about it is. Yeah. Yeah.

Part of that whole chicken and egg thing is that, I mean, I haven't done any surveys, but I imagine if you did a scientific survey of Black America from Vicksburg, Mississippi to Charleston, South Carolina, you know, like from the, Mississippi River to the Atlantic Ocean, you ask everybody, do you care about soccer? Do you think it's an interesting sport? The percentage of positive responses would be pretty low, right? Right, Vince? Yes, I think so.

Okay. At this point right now, yeah, it doesn't have, because, you know, soccer is kind of permeating amongst, I mean, it just is like, you know, obviously immigrant communities are like, yeah, immigrant communities and then white america i mean i play soccer quite a bit you know yeah well i mean i'd say but you know you look at like college football NFL athletes a lot of them both white and black other races come from the SEC you know this is the heart of football country and until there's like some cultural penetration for lack of a better word uh by soccer into the into like the hinterlands this part of the country. I just don't see us.

We could win a World Cup, but we're not going to be producing the kinds of players that, you know, can be like Achilleen Mbapé or a... You know, it's interesting, though, because like, and I will say one positive indicator, if you're hopeful about the future trend of soccer in this country

is it's so different at the youth level than it, than it was when I was growing. I mean, you can't, even put that into words. The amount of money being spent, which again is not a one-to-one translation to success, but the amount of money being spent by parents in Southern California on the West Coast generally, the desire that girls and boys, especially girls, but boys too, have at a very young age to get to the national team to be a part of that, did not, flat out did not exist in that same way when I was a kid.

And I grew up playing AYSO soccer. You know, we, we, we, we, we, uh, we made it to tri-sectionals in my 10-year-old year, you know, like we like, it was, it was a, it was a recreational. It was like, uh, if your parents put you in dance. There was no one that we were around was like, this is what I want to do. And the desire, absolutely affluent white families, uh, more important. but affluent as well, Hispanic families in California. It's a huge focus.

It's a huge, huge focus. And so to your point, it does not have, it is not tapped into the full diversity of America's, um, athletes and talent, but there is momentum around that and it has changed. Obviously, the men's national team now is so, it's such a different makeup of athletes and backgrounds that, well, than it was when I was a kid. which is, which I think is an important part of putting that ladder down for the next generation too, you know. Right. See, that's what I was hoping. And I thought, once again, I thought maybe it would come in 2022.

Once again, we didn't get the, we didn't break through in the way that I wanted to because of various reasons. But anyway, you know, I listened to this on y'all's show when you were talking about a mic, just about how diverse this team is that, does that help? like when you're talking to when you're talking to when you're talking to viny your son yeah it helps yeah i mean absolutely and it helps with um you know you uh as as as bells was just saying the you know black people in america in that in that specific region that's like tyler's more tapped in on our show tyler's more tapped in with with uh with this team for that reason as well you know i i just and i don't think it's just racial diversity it's the diversity of the storyline. It's not like it's a bunch of Orange County dudes. It's not a bunch of prep school

kids. It's a very American group of people. It's like a very interesting set of stories that's come together. And I don't think I could overstate how much that helps. And, you know, we do have a, we have a small but but very talented group of like elite black dudes who play soccer and Long Beach that have gone into the Galaxy Academies and stuff like that. I think what's difficult about it is the structure is so different from the traditional American sports structure of what it looks like if you're good in sports. There is, it's a trust has to be established with different communities as they're trying to, that like, hey, we're not trying to take your kids out of school at 12 because we're a cult.

Like this is like, you know, this is okay. Like I promise like this is how it happens. And but I do, I do think that's like, you know, you mentioned the tradition of like football and the SEC. That's like a father in in Tennessee, right, who has a kid and the kid comes out a little bit bigger and heavier than the other babies is thinking very clearly of the whole path from that birth to signing the scholarship at the University of Tennessee. Like I know exactly what it looks like.

I know when he's going to be recruited. I know when he's going to get his fourth and fifth star on the rankings. It's a 70-year-old, like, path. And I think that, like, it just is, this is new territory for what it's going to look like to bring more people and to bring more, like, elite athletes, especially into it and not just people who find out they're good as they get older or something, you know. It's, it's, I'll give an example that that reinforces that. So I live like 10 miles south of a high school called Ridgeland High School. And there was a guy who played football there named Vaughn Bell. Maybe you've heard of him.

Played safety for Ohio State. You know, recruited by Georgia, Alabama, and Ohio State. Went to Ohio State in the Urban Meyer years, played safety. And they played in the NFL for a couple different teams. But, like, there are no Vaughn Bells playing soccer in North Georgia right now, you know? And, like, he's like, you know, he's like the best athlete. for the past generation produced by this area. And it does feel like if we win a World Cup,

we'll obviously make progress. But it's like we'd have to win a World Cup to get future Von Bell's parents to get them into soccer. You know, I mean, it's like, we're a long way from that. Yeah.

Well, I do think, like, money is the other part of it. You know, I know I've talked on, on Jenkins and Jones. So my son's multiracial.

he's like part everything except Hispanic basically he's i'm i'm white his mom is is a black and agent so like one thing we have definitely noticed is as the MLB contracts have gotten publicized there's a ton of black kids there's a ton of non-white kids playing baseball that you did not used to see as much in southern california and i know for and some of them are specifically the type of kids who are going to go to long beach polly we are having like we used to with willie McGuin and Tony Gwynn and some of these big names, guys who are stars in basketball or football who are also playing baseball. So, and that 100% has come from just the headlines being out there.

Hey, it's $250 million and $200 million of it's guaranteed, you know. So I, I, there is maybe a little bit of a rising tide there that as the sport gets more popular as the MLS is, is, is, you know, gets its feet under it more and more. And people see numbers there that are exciting to them. It's like you do just fundamentally you have to tap into the craziest people in the world, which is sports parents. And like you said, put soccer on the menu at least with football and basketball and baseball. Yeah.

And to your point, though, just like the example of plodding out the course from the moment the baby is born. Like it's a it's a low effort path. Like they, not to, it's like, okay, when this baby is five, we get them in, we call it Mighty Mites here, whatever, you get them in Mighty Mites. You know, as a local, it costs $60 to sign them up. They get past, they get a helmet, boom, they're there, and they're getting quality coaching. Right. That is going to teach them how to play the game. And then you just move up from there.

And really up until you get to like seven on seven travel stuff, which you really don't have to do. You really do not have to do whatsoever to become a. elite at football, you're not coming out your pocket for too much. And we talked to the CEO of the U.S. Soccer Federation about this. And, you know, he identified it too. He's just like, I mean, essentially soccer is a premium sport. To be involved in soccer and to get quality coaching that you would need in America to become a star in a top five European league or just to play in the top five European

league. That is all behind the paywall in a way that elite baseball stuff is not in a way that, well, not elite, but yeah, I'll say elite. Elite baseball stuff is not, I'm not talking about club. I'm talking about just the fact that you can get quality coaching at your Cal Ripkin or your Babe Ruth League or whatever and football in the same way. The one analogy I would use that I think soccer needs to find a way to bridge the gap with is track and field, which I think similarly is a sport that captures people's attention in windows here, right? Like there will be a couple weeks during the Olympics when you're sitting McLaughlin's very famous and America is very into track and field.

Track and field is better in my opinion than track and field similarly very high barrier of cost to enter. It costs money to go to every meet that you're going to enter. The equipment's very expensive if you're a field athlete. Most people are having to hire some kind of a private training, training. Even at like we have the California state team championship teams, Long Beach Polly and Woolsey. Wilson win state almost every year, their elite hurdlers are still usually paying our hurdles coach on the side because it's just very specialized coaching. It's not like, hey, these guys played football growing up and they're coaching kids playing football. It's a very specialized form of coaching.

But track and field is better than soccer at if a kid is a freak, it's a real low cost of entry. And because of the objective nature of, of you can see, oh, we put this 11 year old on the track for the first time and he ran this. Hey, bring him over here and let's start talking to him and let's start hooking him up with, with coaches. And that stuff just gets taken care of. It's harder to do, it's harder to measure that with soccer. It's harder to measure who's going to have the instincts.

It's harder to, you don't get handed a soccer ball or kick to soccer ball for the first time and show that you have an incredible first touch, right? that has to be developed and shown over time. So I think that's the difficult thing for them to figure out because what I can tell you, being a crazy sports parent myself, knowing crazy sports parents and then having in my job, you know, that's essentially our readership.

If you go to any dad anywhere in this country as a member of a U.S. national team and you say your son has a professional future in this sport, they are going to do anything that you tell them to do. But that level of contact with, like you were talking about Bells, the great athletes from your region, I don't know who's doing that from a U.S. soccer perspective.

But I'll tell you right now, we had a track and field, we had a sprinter from Long Beach State who was in the Winter Olympics because the U.S. bobsled coach went to her and said, hey, we need sprinters for the bobsled team because there's someone doing the steering, but there's really someone who's just getting the start

at the beginning of the race, and we like to have an experienced sprinter. She signed up. She spent three years working on how to, you know, she'd never done anything. She lived in Southern California a whole life, moved to Utah, trained with the U.S. team, all this stuff, and became an Olympian

because someone had that outreach of you fit the profile of what we're looking for to be an Olympian with us. And I think that that, it's difficult and it's expensive and it's time consuming and you're going to have misses but I do think like fundamentally that bottom rung of the ladder is what needs to happen and the bottom round of the ladder and soccer is five years old you know it's like you got to you got to like they got to like start touching the ball and learning how to manipulate the ball at five if they get to 10 yeah too late and that and that's what you talk about of so it has to be

parents of five-year-olds and it has to be really five-year-olds. I mean, it really does have to be that like you want to go to the park and beat your friends at the sport you're all playing. And that's where I do ultimately, even though I think we're all a little depressed about it, it sounds like I do ultimately think that some high level success is kind of like a necessary part of the recipe for that transformation. Well, let me ask you this though, because you have, you have two kids, Mike, I have two kids. It does seem like, the generational change just may be coming, regardless of the U.S.

having success on the field. As far as soccer just being one of our sports, I think when our kids become our age, I think it just will be one of the country sports. Are you seeing that same sea changes? It's been really cool for me with my son. So my son, he turns 13 on Saturday, turns 13 on Saturday.

He's having such a different child. around the sport than I did. And he's, he's basketball and baseball, his favorite sports, likes football. And then soccer is sort of like there as well. And,

and what the craziest thing to me was, he asked me for the first game to go to a watch party with his friends. Because they had all been texting about, there's this big sporting goods store here that they turn their, their third floor is like empty and they'll do like big community events there. Okay. And he said, he's like, can I go over there because my friends are going to watch the game?

And I go, how many friends? And he's like, oh, you know, it's kind of his four closest friends from school. And I go, now that, and I said to my wife, I said, that's a sentence that no one said in 1996. I mean, it just was not out there. I'm going to a World Cup watch party with my friends in middle school was just not a part of the culture. So I do think that it is changing. I think the viewership numbers reflect that as well, right? I mean, they're, they're, they're talking about this being a NFL level viewership event, which all of a sudden now you'll start seeing money from Nike and other companies where they are looking for five-year-olds.

Right. I mean, like, you know, they found LeBron at a, at 12 or 13 or whatever. I mean, when the money numbers add up, there are people invested in doing some of the stuff that we're talking about. But yeah, I think it's, it's different. I mean, I'll be honest with you. I'm trying to talk some of our friends out of the amount of money they're spending on club soccer for their kids. Where I'm like, look, I know what elite athletes look like. I mean, I've covered a number of them at every sport.

And I'm like, if you're spending $8 to $10 grand on this stuff a year, put it in a $529 account and you don't have to worry about the college scholarship. Like, you'll just be able to pay for college. But there's so many people. I mean, especially on the girl's side, but it is picking up on the boys. side. They're spending so much money on it. And so that shows that the demand and the passion is there from sports parents. What's crazy to me is there's not even that many opportunities for college scholarships for men's players comparatively. And there's been an explosion over the last five years in Southern California of boys clubs. And that's where I look at those parents. I'm like,

you're not even, there isn't even an end to the runway here that you're spending all this money for. I go, the girls parents are justifying it by imagining their kids. kids going to get a scholarship to UCLA or North Carolina or whatever, right? But, you know, so the desire is there. I do think building something out at the NCAA level. I mean, really building it at every level is, is what it takes. It's as big a high school sport in Southern California as basketball or baseball in terms of readership and interest.

You know, and I think we see it at the World Cup level. But, you know, the, it would be great for the game if the MLS could, figure some of its stuff out. It would be great if, you know, the men's game had more of a presence at the collegiate level. Just because that's what gets, you know, that's what brings more casuals into being passionate fans in this country.

And I mean, they're doing some stuff around it. They're changing college soccer to a year-round thing. USSF has gotten involved. Which college, I mean, this is like recent, like in the past year. Yeah.

They've kind of announced this stuff. So, I mean, it's coming, I guess. But I guess the last, well, go ahead, Bill. Well, I was just going to, I'm, I'm glad you brought up Nike because I feel like the Nike and Adidas. Have you guys watched the hero films for their ad campaigns? Like the six minute ones? You got to.

You got to see them. Nike's one is called Rip the script. And Adidas one is called What Legends of the Game is the one with Timothy Shalameh. And you've seen the brief ads, right? I did see the Shalabay one. Okay. Right. Yeah.

But like the full video where he actually, you get the sense of him like pulling the team together and then they pull up to the field and then Leo Messi and Bad Bunny are there. And, you know, it's like the whole thing. I'll tell you what, those videos do more, I imagine do more to capture like five, six, seven year olds than even the games. You know? And I mean, certainly that's that way in my house. My six year old was watching those with me yesterday and then he immediately wanted to play soccer in the house. Right. had a great little scrimmage.

And yeah. So I just, I just want to, in the midst of all this, salute the shoe brands for doing their job, you know, because they're doing a good job. For sure. I mean, that's a big part of it. We're seeing this revolution. And I think by next summer or two summers from now, it will be widely known nationally. But women's flag football is about to become a huge sport in this country. And it's essentially entirely because Nike decided we'd rather sell football stuff to.

100% of teenagers instead of 50% of them. I mean, like, they spent the money to get that added as an official high school sport in California. They literally, like, hired lobbyists to push that through. They're the reason that's going to be an Olympic sport in LA, you know, on the women's side as well as the men's side. And so, like, it does really, I don't think that's the purity of the sport that we all enjoy, but the truth is to build that infrastructure we're talking about.

It's very expensive. And it has to be the way this country is set up. You know, our athletes make less money to compete for the national teams than any other athletes in the world in any sport. You know, I mean, like, if you're, I mentioned that Olympic bodsletter, like they're getting like a $15,000 stipend or something for the year.

And then you've got to find some way to go live in Colorado Springs and train year round. So it has to be that the shoe companies and the people that are able to make, money selling gear and merge are incentivized to to support it because i mean that's the only way that stuff really gets gets built yeah i've made this point before but similar to a u basketball like you know you got the shoe circuits nike adidas under armor um poohumma got one now but but regardless those shoe circuits subsidize the cost for our elite basketball players in this country you know that the stuff costs money it's america everything costs money

I mean, if you've tried to buy World Cup tickets, you know what time it is. Somebody has to subsidize it. In soccer, the only person we got, I mean, we got MLS, I think with a little Adidas help. But that's it. It hasn't been turned on all the way yet. The spigit. Go ahead. But there's also, it's also a storytelling component, you know?

There's a story to these ads that makes it feel like being a street, like a street soccer player is a thing that kids should do, you know? Like, for sure. We're going to play between the two apartment buildings. Nobody can beat us. I can see, I can look over on the couch and I can see my kids like eyes light up when they see that, you know? And I don't even know if it's true of America, but Adidas is kind of making it seem like it might be somewhere. And I appreciate that. I mean, if you're trying to catch up on 100 years of tradition, you have to fake it so you make it a little bit, right? I mean, I just like that. It's just part of the equation. You have to, you can't be like, you're going to be the first kid to do.

No one wants to be the first kid to do something. No. That's not on any six-year-old's agenda. It's like, how can I be as different from the other kids as possible, you know? No. It's about belonging and, you know, fitting into something. Yeah, it's true. And so the last thing, Mike, before we get you out of here,

you've hit on it a little bit, but we do want to get into Southern California soccer just because of the fact that when you look at fertile grounds for developing future U.S. men's national team talent, for whatever reason, like, SoCal has all the ingredients. Yeah. For whatever reason, it hasn't come to fruition in the way that you would really think it should. Like, you know, we have Haji Wright on this roster. I mean, Haji, he's a same age as pulling them.

So he's 98. Yeah, he's a 98. So he's 28 at this point. But since then, I mean, really, it's been pretty dry, bro. Like, we covered youth national teams up to the full men's national team. The amount of kids coming out of L.A. and the surrounding areas, I mean, it is very small. On the men's side, on the women's side. I was going to say, because that tells you the exact story of my.

answer is on the women's side, that's historically a huge percentage of the team. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So right now we got the Thompson sisters. I mean, so Cataritan Baccario came out of what, San Diego, Thompson's sister's local to L.A., etc. Yeah.

So on the women's side, it's no issues. But yeah, well, why are we not seeing the same thing on the men side? I just think it's kind of an amalgamation of all the things we've talked about. Like there's a ton of stuff capturing. interest in Southern California. And, you know, like we mentioned, like, I know in, I'm sure in Portland and Seattle, they started getting excited about the World Cup, probably earlier than people in Southern California. It really was not until that first men's national team game that it really sort of took over

here. And, you know, look, I mean, I know there's, you probably have listeners in Southern California who are like, I've been excited about it. I'm talking about, like, was it leading ABCCCC? was it leading you know the the tv channels that were not invested in the world cup because they're broadcasting it no mike just real quick we felt the same same thing yeah yeah as invested as we are in this like you know it it felt the exact same over here yeah yeah so um i i think that that's number one it's just southern california is a crowded

market i mean it is like there are there's an melb team and an NBA team and an hl team with no fans out here because the other MLB, NBA, you know, an NFL team, like, that has no fans. I mean, you know, so I think that's a part of it is it's just difficult to break through. What you have, like you said, is you have everything that you would want on the recipe. You have a ton of great athletes. You have an incredible diversity of the type of athletes in that you have, you have white people, you have Hispanic people, you have black people. you do have a large Asian immigrant communities as well like so you really have everything that you would want you have the ability to train outside year round 365 days a year which I think if you look at the number of MLB products out of Southern California that number is way higher than you'd expect it to be in part because of that but I the difference between the men's the boys side of it and the girl's side of it you can't talk enough about how it.

different it is. Every girl I know, every girl my son knows who plays soccer wants to do a youth national team just a training camp, just to get an invite to a training camp. And then they're wearing that backpack every day for the rest of their childhood. It's ingrained in the culture of the sport to such a young age of we're all trying to make the national team. And I don't know, again, a little bit of a chicken or the egg. I don't know if it's because, but we did. We did. We did. We're all trying to make the national team. And I don't know. I don't know if it's because, but we did have great men's players from Southern California. Landon, you know,

from Southern California. And like, I mean, was a beloved, like L.A. Southern California sports figure, like while he was playing. So it's not like that,

that I can see this guy doesn't exist. I truly don't know why, um, that the, the sort of like the twigs you're there and you're, you're doing the thing with the rocks and it just like has it caught fire. Um, but I,

I, I, I do think part of, of it is, you know, you've got to have that youth outreach and for people to see that path from being a good young player to making a lot of money as a professional and being on the men's national team. And it feels very, you know, other sports that are trying to get to this next level, you know where all of the, and soccer is bigger than these sports, but it's like, you know where the volleyball national team players are coming from in America. You know where the water polo

national team players you're coming from all of these u.s men's guys it feels like they took their own like they're at the end of their own like lord of the rings journey it's not like a road that there's just like here's the freeway for elite athletic talent to this team you know it's like well my dad played in the NFL but he wanted me to try something different like you know it's it's just i think that's part of like and southern california is where you would probably plant the flag and go, we want you. We want you more than the other sports. We're going to make sure you're getting paid in Europe, you know, what the other people are playing. But I do think it's like, part of it is it's difficult to take kids out of the house here at a young age. It's difficult to,

I was just reading one of Wright Thompson's profiles on Messi. And I was thinking about it from the perspective of a sports writer here. Like, no one would sign up for this. No one here would sign up for this of like you know here send him yeah yeah you know unless you really were credible because like i said if they believe you they'll say yes to anything but it has to it's not it doesn't yet feel credible to like you know step outside of the mainstream and and um commit to this sport full time at the age that you know to bells's point is really required because it's just not a it's not a sport you can do it's not landed donovan's time you can't do it in high school find out really good at it and then be a world level player it's just not that way yeah wish i had a better

answer i wish i had a solvable i would go to the u.s soccer federation right now and say give me a million dollars and i'll tell you how to flip it in southern california what so so did the galaxy not have any um bro they're all going to play for nat in charlie julian julian alvarez uh Alex Mendez? I mean, or they flame out, or they flame out. I think it's difficult to like,

to put into words. So it's, the soccer culture in Southern California, there is an element of like valley in L.A. like, you know, very affluent white people. But the soccer culture here is like largely Hispanic.

And, you know, like this is a known thing. I'm not, you know, everyone knows this in Long Beach at least, that like, they don't play league games the week after the Christmas break because all of the kids are home in Mexico.

Like with grandma and grandpa. And so they're all missing the week after the Christmas break. They just move all the league games a week later. And then when the kids come back, they play. Like it has to be, you know, that border for soccer is quite like porous. And it moves in both directions kind of at all times. And there has to be something because it. It is a huge rivalry, and it is like my wife teaches at a high school in Long Beach.

Like, if the USA plays Mexico, there's going to be a healthy split at best for the USA team. So, you know, but that's again to me, like that whole chicken of the egg of like, if you have some success, you know, maybe that maybe that flips a little bit. But I think that that part of the battle in Southern, that's the other part of the battle in Southern California is you've got to make it a team, team USA terror. with the soccer culture and it's you know again probably 50 50 at best so all right i mean we get the next laminia mall here in the u.s it's going to go 75 25 you know i actually completely agree with you like and it will probably happen in one day that we will all walk out outside of our houses and kids are wearing yamal jerseys like you know or the american yamal like but that just isn't you know we that hasn't happened yet but i do think like of like look at what an otani has done i mean

japan always cared about baseball but look at what otani is done for baseball in that country i mean it's it's insane it really is that like you one guy who could be 14 years old right now could be the one who changes everything you know which is part of what's so fun about it it is agreed thanks for doing this mike appreciate you guys And I had a, had a, had a blast. That was a fun. Got me all fired up for the, for the, for the, for the game on Wednesday. Where are you watching?

Where are you going to watch at home? Are you going to go go to the sporting goods store with your son? Yeah, I was, I was actually just talking about it. I was like, you want to have friends over here? Do you want to go meet someone? We have a, um, I coach his all-star baseball team. We have a practice, unfortunately, at seven. So I'm like, we really need to.

I'm hoping we're up three-oh at that point, you know? Like, it starts at five, right, right, right. Yes, yes. I'm sorry. coast time, West Coast time, Vince. But yeah,

so I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I don't, I don't know. I'm,

I'm, I'm sort of like, it's cool as a parent. And I'm sure you guys have similar experience. I'm kind of like letting him take the lead on it of like, what sounds cool to you, bro? Like,

is it, what's cool to me is seeing you so fired up about it. Um, you know, he's thinking about getting jerseys and stuff like that. Like that's, you know, I'm,

I'm, I'm fired up for all that stuff. So we'll see. I'll, I'll shoot Vince a message and let him know, though. Okay. All right. Hey, thanks everybody for listening.

Appreciate Mike. Gardeboscio. Appreciate him. And a link to his show. It will be in the show notes. We will see you.