joedirt wrote:
As a father of daughters I think it is awesome that there are women's sports and that the US women are internationally competitive. On a similar note, I enjoy following the fine female runners we have in the US as well as they tend to perform better internationally than the men. That being said, women's sports will truly take off financially when women (who out number men) start to tune into women's professional sports the way men do. Advertisers love to target female consumers, as they make the majority of purchasing decisions for households. If women were to tune in like men do, they would be paid more than their male counterparts.
Well said. I sometimes feel like a unicorn for liking the US men's team AND the USA women's team - to read any comment section, forum, etc. anywhere online, it would seem like it's an either/or proposition. Everything I see is some whacko feminist claiming that the women could beat the men, then some whacko mysognist ranting about how Rapinoe is a man and is so horrible for not singing the anthem (not kneeling anymore, but just not singing along to it... Jesus Christ!)
But my own little rant aside, you raise an incredibly apt point. The US women's national team gets a lot of attention and deservedly so, but beyond the national team schedule (which is much broader than the men's national team schedule for a number of reasons), NOBODY shows up to watch and support the Women's National Soccer League - not even the girls and women whom the US team is supposedly inspiring every day . The average attendance per game is something like 6,000, and that's one of the top women's leagues in the world. The men's MLS isn't close to the best, simply because the big money European leagues have had such a head start, and it still draws in over 20,000 a game, with particularly well-supported teams like Seattle and Atlanta pulling in averages in the 40K-50K range.
If people want to solve the revenue thing and help boost women's player salaries, there is a massive, massive opportunity to help by supporting your local NWSL team,. Go to the games, buy the merch, etc. I mean, damn, tickets are available! But people don't go.