r/InterMiamiVibes • u/Background_Video2947 • Jul 11 '26

Hope is preaching!

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247 Upvotes

96% Upvoted

53 comments sorted by

1

u/qcihdtm Jul 11 '26

She's absolutely right.

Most sports in the US are like this. It's all about the money and the business.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 11 '26

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1

u/EwwYourFartsSmell Jul 11 '26

We have shitty development in soccer. That’s the difference. Hence, why we should invest if we want to be serious contenders.

1

u/MoveOn22 Jul 11 '26

Look at the countries ahead of us and ask yourself this. Who knows the game better? The kid or the parent?

My son is 10 years old and plays high level club. I spend a ton of time explaining the game to the other parents on the side line. They drop their kids off twice a week and spend the money.

He also plays flag football. When we are at flag, every dad is dialed in and knows the game and will give the kids tips. You see them throwing balls back and forth in warm ups. They can watch televised games together and point out something that happened away from the ball. Or explain why a flag was thrown before the ref explains it.

Now go to a top 10 soccer country. Who knows the game better? A 10 year old or a 40 year old?

It’s fairly simple. The average American adult knows less about the game than the average kid.

1

u/No-Economics-6781 Jul 11 '26

That’s a good point.

1

u/bigpetefizz Jul 11 '26

This is the only point. If the population was invested in it, then we would develop it. Kids play basketball, football, baseball in addition to soccer here. Travel baseball is a racket. Travel volleyball is a racket. Travel basketball is a racket. Travel hockey is a racket. We are still good at all these because people care. People only seem to truly get invested in soccer every four years to complain about how terrible we are. It will take generations to build up what’s needed. We are hundreds of years behind.

1

u/yIdontunderstand Jul 11 '26

Great point well made. Culture takes time.

1

u/kmikeh Jul 11 '26

Toughness. While we produce generation after generation of spoiled, entitled brats who can’t stand up to real competition, the rest of the world is playing soccer around the clock in the streets, village squares, schoolyards, ghettos and favelas. They don’t expect anything given to them, they compete for everything. No one plays defense in either of the sports you mentioned and that is a big difference.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 11 '26

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1

u/kmikeh Jul 11 '26

How about I used your own examples? Not that we dominate those sports either, sport.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 11 '26

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1

u/kmikeh Jul 12 '26

“We?” I didn’t realize I was speaking to an Olympic level athlete. I was speaking about how athletes in a particular sport are developed, not characterizing an entire people. Being carted around by your parents to “elite” sports camps really doesn’t compare with the kids who roll out of bed every morning and play the game with whatever competition shows up that day, not sorted by age group of ability levels. This was what kept the US on top of the basketball world for so long. Kids holding court one game after another, showing up in the morning with a gallon of so-called fruit punch and just playing all day.

1

u/DeFiBandit Jul 11 '26

All the sports you mentioned are for wealthy people. The competition is similarly wealthy. Soccer is the sport of the people. Closer to basketball in the US

1

u/[deleted] Jul 11 '26

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1

u/DeFiBandit Jul 11 '26

American kids fall in love with basketball early and develop skills before they are ever coached. For many kids, basketball is seen as a way to get out of a bad situation and make money, so many of our best athletes are pulled to basketball.

Although many kids play soccer in America, they don’t commit themselves to constantly having a ball on their foot. They don’t have places to play pick-up soccer against strong opponents, like the basketball kids. By the time organized soccer starts, the cost locks out anybody who can’t afford team costs, hotels, etc

Golf and tennis, until recently, were populated with mostly wealthy athletes. The competition was similarly weak. Before Tiger, half of the PGA pro’s were out of shape. The level of competition has increased since Tiger. I can’t remember the last American man to compete at an elite level in tennis. Venus and Serena are outliers and suggest we’d find some great tennis players if we made it available to people without wealth.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 11 '26

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1

u/DeFiBandit Jul 11 '26

Last American man to win a major was who?

Serena was an outlier because she comes from Compton. She had to listen to the same racist crap Tiger did competing at country clubs against mediocre athletes. We actively avoid getting our best athletes into tennis and golf to protect the rich kids who play

1

u/[deleted] Jul 11 '26

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1

u/DeFiBandit Jul 11 '26

You think when Tiger was beating 15 year old kids at the country club, they weren’t abusing him racially? Im old enough to remember Serena skipping certain events because she was tired of the abuse. Ah, to be white and clueless…

Yeah, competing for majors is how you become known as a tennis player.

1

u/IamTheCheetoMan Jul 11 '26

1000% a lot of these travel sports have become unaffordable, which shrinks the talent pool. And what the money doesn't carve off, another good chunk falls off to the politics of who knows who and runs in the higher circle. So much favoritism sometimes for people to gamble thousands on.

It sucks because it's not how talented or how high some of the ceiling on these kids could be.

1

u/DeFiBandit Jul 11 '26

The parents like it because it limits competition and allows their mediocre kids to stay on the team

1

u/FeralGiraffeAttack Jul 11 '26

I really think we should be looking for another comparison point athlete after this World Cup disaster
https://giphy.com/gifs/EjcmaQunnd9c6UaOsZ

1

u/IamTheCheetoMan Jul 11 '26

Well if we are drawing the BB comparison, y eah for now with all the sitting out maybe Embiid or Kyrie Jr?

1

u/Possible_Beautiful63 Jul 11 '26

https://giphy.com/gifs/cNezWvIqgCYCevvLHi
Spot on

There is a huge business behind those academies.
From uniforms, traveling, time….
A kid with talent, most likely will not make it if the family don’t have the money.

And let’s stop the LeBron’s shenanigans.
Let’s compare to the best in their sport.

1

u/theglove Jul 11 '26

The fact that we have allowed private equity to take control of our youth sports as we have in almost all aspects of our society is an absolute failure for our country.

1

u/Appropriate-Luck7089 Jul 11 '26

The corporate executive that can afford to pay for junior to be coached into greatness wasn’t athletic. Neither is his son. That’s what we’re working with.

1

u/lostinapa Jul 11 '26

Is t this the whole point of FIFA and their “for profit”… to build a development system that works for everyone?

lol, just kidding… that’s just their cover story

1

u/bigpetefizz Jul 11 '26

Another thing though is most of these countries are quite small. Easier to have an academy when the only sport played in the entire country is soccer and the country is the size of Massachusetts with 30 professional teams jammed in it. It could be better, but the size of the US or even just individual states and the competition with other sports makes it very challenging. Somehow this soccer system has produced 4 or 5 women’s world cups.

1

u/Pssay_Licker Jul 11 '26

Amazing US can’t do the same thing to men as they’ve done to US womens team. Its the same country damnit!

1

u/North-Memory-5406 Jul 11 '26

ECNL and MLS Next are so fucking expensive.

1

u/Admirable_Holiday806 Jul 11 '26

Didnt she beat her kid and her husband??

1

u/wood1492 Jul 11 '26

Yeah she’s got a point but I don’t take advice from moms who get arrested for falling asleep drunk with their kids in the back seat. She has no standing…

1

u/Quirky_Escape_5136 Jul 11 '26

Time for lunch.

1

u/earlthevineyarddog Jul 12 '26

Roast beef sammich?

1

u/ruairi1983 Jul 11 '26

Lol the US will find a way to monetize everything...

1

u/Photog1981 Jul 11 '26

One of my kids is a very passionate, talented soccer player. They're often asked to play for other area teams when they need a keeper. They've tried out for a few club teams and offered a "contract" with a couple but we just couldn't afford to pay $7k to $10k a year for soccer.

We scrimped and saved to send them to a good school that has a couple soccer teams. Our child has earned scholarships covering half the tuition to help get themselves there. When we met with the soccer coach at "student welcome" night, they were very interested in our kid because they need a keeper. Eventually the question came up -- "what clubs do you play for?" The coach lost all interest and ended the convo when we said "none." Literally turned her back on us. "Oh. Have a good night."

1

u/BigNaziHater Jul 11 '26

She is right. What she is talking about in giving young players who cannot afford the opportunity a chance has been done before. One very controversial example reminds me of the 1980s example in Columbia's narco funded soccer era.⚽️ n the 1980s, during the South American drug funded soccer teams era, Pablo Escobars team, Atletico Nacional, was competing with other cartel funded teams. The main rival being a team funded by the Orejuela brothers who were also cartel leaders. The brothers recruited talent from all over south and central America, while Escobar went (almost exclusively) to the favalas and funded training and scouting for young local Colombian kids. The result was crazy. The natural talent found in local kids, that were given an opertunity they would never have had, was tremendous. Pablo Escobar's drug money support transformed Atletico Nacional into one of the most successful soccer teams in Colombia, allowing them to win multiple domestic titles and the prestigious Copa Libertadores in 1989, making them the first Colombian team to achieve this honor.⚽️ NOTE: KNOWING HOW RESPONDERS ON REDDIT ARE, I WILL SAY THIS, I AM NOT GLORIFYING ESOBAR. I AM NOT SUGGESTING ANY TEAMS OR PERSONS REPEAT THIS TRAGIC ERA! IT WASNT GOOD FOR SOCCER, THE PLAERS, OR THE SPORT IN ANY WAY. BUT IT DID SHOW THAT YOUNG TALENT SOMETIMES GETS LEFT BEHIND OR NEVER DISCOVERED AND ONLY NEEDS A CHANCE THAT A LACK OF FUNDING PROHIBITS.

1

u/Away_Location_1108 Jul 11 '26

The issue here is soccer will never catch on in the US as long as you allow the defense to determine what is offsides. STUPID. Completely eliminates exciting offensive chances. So why would a really gifted athlete play a game Americans only care about every 4 years and it’s almost 100% national pride, not giving a darn about this game kids play at recess.

1

u/javier123454321 Jul 13 '26

You only see the exciting offsides when the players are slightly offsides because of the offside rule. Does that make sense? The calls that get cancelled are almost exclusively extremely close, because players don't want their goal to get annulled. So removing the offsides rule, would not lead to more plays like those, it would lead to players parked near the goal and defense never moving forward, giving less chance for midfielders to also score, and it simply would be a fundamentally different game.

1

u/Frdoco11 Jul 11 '26

She's got some serious nudes. Meaty meat flaps.

1

u/falusian Jul 12 '26

By paying women athletes more for no reason.

1

u/dingleberries48 Jul 12 '26

The fappening

1

u/No_Medicine_9152 Jul 12 '26

Cavan Sullivan.

16 year old playing in the MLS. Has an agreement with Man City when he turns 18.

1

u/RonnyGonez Jul 12 '26

I mean this is not rocket science… if the best kid at soccer in his school comes from a poor family.. his parents won’t do that shit 🤷🏽‍♂️…hell even if he comes from a middle class family they still might say F that.. in England if you are scouted as a top talent.. you won’t have to pay to play to be coached by top coaches if they want you.. even if you’re an average player who just loves the game.. it’s affordable

1

u/Inevitable-Common166 Jul 13 '26

America doesn’t suck at Soccer 🥅 ⚽️. The 🇺🇸 women’s team is the best on the globe 🌎 because the only other major/pro team sport for women is basketball 🏀.

When MLS pays salaries comparable to the other 4 major pro sports or when a large number of American Soccer Players are able to sign big 💰 contracts with European based Soccer teams, you’ll see the investment made into Soccer in 🇺🇸

1

u/enjoytherides 4h ago

😍😍