I am happy to have gone to Miami FC for the first time, so I have been able to put up and shut up as far as supporting this team. I do have some things that I saw that were mighty troubling both for their future as well as the future of the game down here.

Who is their market?
I really don't know who they are trying to aim towards. Miami's soccer culture is unlike any other culture in the country. They are fervent yet fickle and have not permitted a team to flourish. They have taken the path of the Florida Marlins where they believed that bringing béisbol to South Florida was a can't-miss venture. With the Cuban, Dominican and, in more recent years, Venezuelan and Nicaraguan communities the Marlins were going to grow exponentially. Well with the new stadium being pushed at all costs, South Florida could be ready to see the world's biggest suntan machine. Dolphin Stadium is now a cavern where games see more people working the parking lot and concessions than there are fans.

Even in the days of the Ft. Lauderdale Strikers, the suppport of the hispanic crowd was not as evident. Soccer clubs have always been looking in the wrong places for fans. Soccer is not a middle-class sport. Soccer is not a way for kids to get to college around the world. Soccer is a way to get out of poverty. Soccer is what American football and basketball is to inner city kids stateside. Soccer is a way to get mamá her dream house. The one thing that these two different vantage points coincide is that they will get you laid at one point or another. I have always said to people that the day that soccer is being played in inner cities on basketball courts and truly becomes a way to get out of the hood or the barrio... then we have finally arrived.

The hispanic and Caribbean communities see this as clear as day. When you do not market a team with them in mind, they will turn their backs. How do they express that isolation, by not even knowing your team exists.

So it doesn't matter if you bring Diego Serna, or hell... Romário, if you do not coddle the markets that you are supposed to... they will not come. But first and foremost, you have to figure out who you are looking to come to the games.

It's here in the United States where the sport is a more suburban game. When soccer moms jump in their minivans, SUVs, or hybrids to go to the park and see little Joey or Sally run after a ball. Soccer doesn't run in their veins. Yet the lion's share of the marketing is aimed at this demographic. Coral Gables, Coconut Grove, Kendall, Pinecrest, Sunrise, Brickell and a host of other areas are where the marketing is being aimed towards. What happened to Little Haiti, Homestead, Florida City? Why not aim your marketing at the Salvodorean community, Costa Rican, Honduran? They are just as fervent about the game as anyone else. They would be more than willing to spend their hard earned money on a product if there is the talent and... atmosphere.

Atmosphere
Let's not kid ourselves, an Argentine or Brazilian would rather stay home and watch Boca Juniors or Corinthians. When they think of the game they think of how it was at home. Fans from those countries are not coming to watch a game unless there is... atmosphere. Fans from that part of the world like celebration, they like to go to a game and a carnival breaks out. That is what they are looking for. They are looking for chants that question the visiting team's manhood. They are looking for a way to celebrate life as well as the passion that they so deeply have ingrained in their DNA.

We see games from South America and there is atmosphere, for better or for worse. Obviously fan behavior will be an issue, but let's cross that bridge when we get there.

Is the glass half empty or half full? Who cares. Check if it's whisky or scotch, first. If it's water go put some ice in the damn glass.