Dana White Q&A: "(Soccer is) the least-talented sport on Earth"

[spasgur]

The argument of there being too few goals in soccer is almost only coming from people who know little about soccer and who regularly watch sports with a lot of goals, points, etc. IMO the fact that there aren't 10-20 goals makes it a lot more exciting and makes the elation once a goal is scored a lot bigger.
But me having a discussion about soccer with people who know nothing about the sport is as pointless as someone having a discussion about baseball (which is aaaaaaass!) with me.

[kickboxer1987]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sD_8prYOxo John Cleese puts it more eloquently that I can.

I love MMA but to say soccer does not require talent is just plain silly. To rip on soccer because only "3 points" are made per match is also ridiculous, compare scoring a goal in soccer to making a touchdown in a NFL game. Image you only get awarded 1 point for making a touchdown (0 for anyting else) and the scores would be awfully similar to a soccer match.

The post is just plain ignorance and will not help him push the sport more into the mainstream (globally)

[flarg]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sD_8prYOxo John Cleese puts it more eloquently that I can.

I love MMA but to say soccer does not require talent is just plain silly. To rip on soccer because only "3 points" are made per match is also ridiculous, compare scoring a goal in soccer to making a touchdown in a NFL game. Image you only get awarded 1 point for making a touchdown (0 for anyting else) and the scores would be awfully similar to a soccer match.

The post is just plain ignorance and will not help him push the sport more into the mainstream (globally)

Not really... I don't even think (American)Football at the professional level has had a 0-0 score in this millennium, and field goal only games are very hard to come by. In soccer, 0-0 and 1-0 games are very common, at least in my experience.

Not saying that I agree with Dana. While almost every single other sport might have more barriers to entry than soccer(the point Dana was making), that in turn provides a huge pool of people from which professionals are picked from which in turn, makes it talented.

[sriderz]

Not really... I don't even think (American)Football at the professional level has had a 0-0 score in this millennium, and field goal only games are very hard to come by. In soccer, 0-0 and 1-0 games are very common, at least in my experience.

Not saying that I agree with Dana. While almost every single other sport might have more barriers to entry than soccer(the point Dana was making), that in turn provides a huge pool of people from which professionals are picked from which in turn, makes it talented.

American football matches are also about 4 hours long after all those breaks?

Soccer has more barriers to entry at the professional level than most sports in that it is the most widely played sport in the world, so if you're not both good technically, and a good athlete, you wont be able to play professionally. Alot of other sports you can be one or the other, and make a pro team.

[kickboxer1987]

Not really... I don't even think (American)Football at the professional level has had a 0-0 score in this millennium, and field goal only games are very hard to come by. In soccer, 0-0 and 1-0 games are very common, at least in my experience.

Not saying that I agree with Dana. While almost every single other sport might have more barriers to entry than soccer(the point Dana was making), that in turn provides a huge pool of people from which professionals are picked from which in turn, makes it talented.

Here is a source from the English premier league, only one 0 - 0 match. This is the champions league (most prestigious cup) no 0 - 0 match during the play offs so far.
You seem to be right that no recent football match has ever gone without any touchdowns (cant find any source). The scores do get a lot more similar though. Just because most American sports you can get points in a variety of ways means the score generally look a lot higher.

If Dana says that soccer is tedious because he does not like to watch 2x 45 minutes just as boxing can become long and cumbersome with 12 rounds he might have a valid point. But right now he just plain ignorant.

He also comes of contradictory... "everybody gets fighting" and in the same breath he says "even 3 year olds can play soccer"... Lol whut? a three year old can also throw a punch, does that mean he can box?

[Pirate Eater]

Is he somehow suggesting that 3 year olds can't fight? My daughter has a really solid chin and she's 4.

[tantryl]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sD_8prYOxo John Cleese puts it more eloquently that I can.

I'm a big fan of Cleese but it's a pretty hard argument that soccer players have to be creative and intelligent. I mean two of the biggest English guys are Wayne Rooney and David Beckham. If you have any idea who they are, you know that creative and intelligent are not words you associate with them.

[Roundhouse]

You seem to be right that no recent football match has ever gone without any touchdowns (cant find any source). The scores do get a lot more similar though. Just because most American sports you can get points in a variety of ways means the score generally look a lot higher.

I'm not proud of this, but pretty sure my Buffalo Bills dropped a game to the Cleveland Browns (yes, the Browns) by a score of 9-6 just a couple of years ago.

Clevelands starting quarterback (Derek Anderson) went 3 of 17 passing en route to victory. Ok, I'm going to need a couple of days to recover again.

[Onion]

I'm really curious why there is soccer discussion in the MMA forum...

[cheeto101]

I'm really curious why there is soccer discussion in the MMA forum...

Its not like we don't have Jon Fitch fights to talk about it we want to talk about something thats boring as ****