CyState85 said:

If I’m a guy like Alcantara or Ramirez, it would be hard to see guys making 30-50 times more than you eating up playing time and blocking your path towards breaking out.

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If I was Alcantara, I'd be thankful that I'm getting major league checks every week when I haven't shown I can hit RH pitching at any level.

Almost like a TJ 2.0 era with all the new faces.

This guy gets jacked up on Monster

WIBadger said:

Yeah, I’m generally not a fan of monster. The bigger issue I have is that they’re also changing the name, so the official name is “Monster Energy Big 12 Football”

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And Men's and Women's Basketball. That logo is going to be all over everything for a while.

"How dare you leave $1 million on the table by not selling beer?"

"How dare you take $1 million in corporate sponsor money?"

Tailg8er said:

Also women's golf, 43 women cleared $1M in earnings on the LPGA in 2025.

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Yep, and the best women’s golfer is American. We have by far and away the best women’s soccer and basketball programs. Softball too. Our women’s volleyball team has medaled in every Olympics but 2 since 1984. We dominate women’s sand volleyball.

If the desire was there culturally, we’d dominate men’s soccer too. Or at the very least be one of the best programs in the world.

Honestly, the only sport America isn’t elite at, and at least matches other countries’ interest in, is tennis.

SolterraCyclone said:

I disagree. You need good athleticism to be an elite soccer player. You need excellent foot-eye coordination, agility, speed, endurance. Those are all athletic traits. Like any sport, to truly excel you need more than just athleticism, but the baseline is being a great athlete.

You can’t just pick any kid off the street, give them unlimited coaching and resources and turn them into an elite soccer player.

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Sure you need those traits but most can be taught. The point is you don’t need elite size or speed to be a world class soccer player, technique and skill beats all that. Just playing professionally your speed, endurance and agility will already have a good baseline.

You could 100% could turn a kid that had the right drive and determination to be an elite soccer player with those resources. Europe is littered with those kinds of guys that just worked harder than anyone else. You don’t top end size or speed to deliver. Hell if you lack endurance congrats your a 65-70min sub that comes on and just scores

cyputz said:

Not enough $$$

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Initially thought the same. Assuming it’s on the 25 yard line where the conference logo is now, we are actually in the upper tier of field rights, per Gemini

BigJCy said:

Thought this was a pretty good watch. Tim & Landon did a good job discussing last night and the future. They don't sound too optimistic about what is going to happen with the USMNT in 2030.

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Not listening to 80 mins of a show with those two but it depends on what people are talking about when being optimistic.

The US has zero chance of actually winning a World Cup until the top end talent improves, if that’s the goal you’re going to be disappointed. With the expansion of the WC I expect similar results to this year for 2030 with ideally winning or at least being much more competitive in the round of 16. The talent and development will continue to improve, the commitment to coaching should continue to improve and I think people can see that the passion has never been better.

Something that often is overlooked is while the US has been getting better the rest of the world hasn’t been sitting idly by just watching, they have also been improving and most importantly creating depth.

The US always had a massive hole at center back it’s just with the easy home country schedule and easier completion with the expansion we didn’t play a single team with a top tier attack till Belgium and were exposed

jmb said:

There are two sports for women to go pro in. Basketball and soccer. That is your answer. There are two sports females see as viable outside Olympic sports.

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cyclonespiker33 said:

There are women's volleyball athletes that have contracts over a million dollars.

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Also women's golf, 43 women cleared $1M in earnings on the LPGA in 2025.

FriendlySpartan said:

Except in soccer you don’t need the best athlete, you need the highest amount of skill and technique. Big difference. Also while I totally agree youth sports are expensive high school football is still the best type of team football you are going to get. AAU is expensive but also allows free rides to the top tier which soccer is only starting to do with the academies

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I disagree. You need good athleticism to be an elite soccer player. You need excellent foot-eye coordination, agility, speed, endurance. Those are all athletic traits. Like any sport, to truly excel you need more than just athleticism, but the baseline is being a great athlete.

You can’t just pick any kid off the street, give them unlimited coaching and resources and turn them into an elite soccer player.

Not enough $$$

cycloneman003 said:

Tim Howard’s been shitting on this group of USA players for years. I put zero stock into anything he has to say, as he clearly does not like this particular core.

Loves to talk as if we don’t remember him sucking ass in goal for all those WC qualifiers in 2018 where we failed to qualify.

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I was gonna say the same thing, once he became a pundit he found his niche just being overly critical of everything while also forgetting that he was **** most of his career.

cycloneman003 said:

Tim Howard’s been shitting on this group of USA players for years. I put zero stock into anything he has to say, as he clearly does not like this particular core.

Loves to talk as if we don’t remember him sucking ass in goal for all those WC qualifiers in 2018 where we failed to qualify.

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Or maybe he is right? I'm not an expert enough to know but maybe it is the truth and people tend to get butthurt about that sometimes.

Cyfan1965 said:

My wife used it to compare streaming packages for number of channels vs price. I have not heard the result yet.

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Applying my natural (as compared to artificial) intelligence I believe the answer will be they are all too expensive. But I digress.

BCClone said:

I’m ready for credit cards to get rid of the rewards stuff they do. Now every place you go, you get whacked with a 4% charge if you use a credit card. So to gain that 1-2% reward you gotta spend 4% more. Not much of a deal. It used to be that businesses were content to eat the 1-2% service fee because they didn’t have to worry about bounced checks.

Or the other option, just increase your price 4% and forget the fee. Same deal but at least the customer doesn’t have to look at the fee.

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Yeah, just another wrinkle on modern life. I carry cash for those places. Usually restaurants. I was already trying to make sure the tips I gave were cash, so paying it all in cash is not much a problem.

For other places, yeah, I'll use the card.

I hope the card companies take a hit even if just a bit from this extra greed - by more people using cash.

My wife used it to compare streaming packages for number of channels vs price. I have not heard the result yet.

BigJCy said:

Thought this was a pretty good watch. Tim & Landon did a good job discussing last night and the future. They don't sound too optimistic about what is going to happen with the USMNT in 2030.

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I didn't give this a listen, these are just a few random thoughts of my own. I seem to remember hearing USMNT was one of the youngest teams at the World Cup. Obviously a double-edged sword: either it means they're young and have every potential to get much, much better as they get more experience; or they're young and this is what USMNT is going to be for the next 2-3 cycles.

Pulisic... all I have to say is "what a letdown". Supposed to be the greatest American talent ever put on the pitch, and yet he's nowhere close to being with Donovan and Dempsey on the Mount Rushmore because he never shows up when USMNT needs him.

I don't like it, I don't think it's cool, but what else are we gonna do? We legit have no option.

WIBadger said:

I read it the same way as BCC, everyone will have a combined Big12/Monster Patch

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Could be the minority here, but I think this is cool. Atleast it’s not like nationwide or black rock. Monster (although apart of PepsiCo) has some personality with it.