While Lesley’s studying at an ashram in India, her husband Crayton is guest-posting. Please be kind to him.
I’m not one of those Americans who hate soccer or think it’s a wussy sport or whatever. I really enjoy the games, especially when I can go to the stadium, because as with American football, people-watching is half the fun.
I’ve been to two Mexican league games and one international game, the World Cup qualifier between the U.S. and Mexico last summer, pictured above. (Lesley chronicled some of those experiences here and here.)
I generally understand the game and a little bit of the strategy, though the unevenness in the enforcement of the offsides rule always confuses me. But Mexican soccer has some peculiarities that really throw me off. Maybe some of Lesley’s helpful readers can help me out here.
Why does the Mexican league have two seasons? It does! The first one is called the Apertura, or opening season. The second one is the Clausura, or closing season. (We’re currently in the middle of the Clausura.) Each season has its own champion. If a team manages to win both championships, it’s known as a bicampeonato, and it’s really rare and fantastic, they say. But unless that happens, each year does not have a single team that is declared the best in the country. I find this incredibly frustrating.
Why are teams so inconsistent? Pumas won the Clausura last year, then got off to an awful start in the Apertura. Chivas were so-so in the Apertura last year and are having a great Clausura so far. Nobody seems to be able to get any sort of dominant run going. Good teams turn bad and bad teams turn good almost instantly. Is there a lot of player turnover? Do the good teams lose their players to Europe or something? Is this common in all professional soccer? I feel like in Major League Soccer, the U.S. league I sort of paid attention to, there have been a few consistently good teams over many years.
Why is it so hard to figure out when the game is on? Seriously! I know Mexican soccer fans use sites like Medio Tiempo to keep up, but I have yet to find any central repository of information on what channel the game will be on. The newspapers never have any detail. Is the Pumas game on Televisa this week? Do Chivas play on TV Azteca? According to this, you’re just supposed to know?
How are Chivas still around? My friend Carlos, a diehard Chivas fan, says the Guadalajara team has a special mystique because its roster is, by policy, composed completely of Mexicans. No other team has that rule, he says. So if you’re puro mexicano, Chivas is your team. But this is an international game! Other teams are importing players from Argentina, Brazil, even the U.S. How can a team with this policy, which is either patriotic or xenophobic depending on your view, stay competitive? It automatically shuts out most of the world’s soccer players from its recruiting base!
Carlos is trying to convert me into a Chivas fan. I’m going to watch some games with him this pseudo-season and see if it rubs off. Who knows, maybe this’ll all become clear to me.
Maybe it’s one of those “If you have to ask…” kinds of things?
Why does the Mexican league have two seasons? Double playoffs = double money
But then why doesn’t everybody do it? I mean, if the NFL could make more money by having two seasons, wouldn’t they do that? Or are the Mexicans just way ahead of the curve on this one?
You worry too much about the details. Watch the game. Forget about teams and leagues. Notice the continuity and fluidity of play (i.e. how easily the ball is passed from player to player in an unbroken manner). Look for the player who in one or two movements evades a defender (or many) and has the entire field open up for him. Look for the player who doesn’t make the obvious pass and moves counter intuitively. Notice the pace at which the game is played. It comes as no surprise that it is not uncommon these days for a player who is still in his twenties to suffer a heart attack and die on the pitch. A good game is art in motion and bad game is like watching pinball.
I don’t know how things might play out in Mexico but a very comprehensive site for games and times for many of the more popular leagues worldwide is http://www.livesoccertv.com
I do not recommend to you to support any provincial team.:D
If you are going to support a team, it should be to one located in the D.F. Here are the options:
If you are an uncultured idiot – Cruz Azul
If you are an arrogant mariguano – Pumas
If you are an intelligent person with class – America 😀
Why does the Mexican league have two seasons?
R: For the money, in fact is not an original idea, that is adopted from the South American soccer.
Why are teams so inconsistent?
R: All the fans we wonder the same every year Crayton.
Why is it so hard to appear out when the game is on?
R: In general you have to obtain the calendar before every tournament. You are correct, if you are a fan it is supposed that you have to know. But a good way of knowing is to consult the Record sports newspaper (the form) every Friday.
Thanks so much for the insight, everybody. This was really helpful.
Obet, you’re the first defeno I’ve encountered who is an America fan, to my knowledge. Most of the people I know root for Pumas, which may say a lot about me.
Why does the Mexican league have two seasons?
Because mexican clubs can make much more money in those two seasons then they could if they had one year round season.
Why are teams so inconsistent?
In Mexican soccer its very hard to have a consistent team because the clubs always sell and buy new players after every season.
Why is it so hard to figure out when the game is on?
Because 4 different tv stations own the broadingcasting rights of the 17 teams. So if two teams are playing at the same time their only going to show one of the games.
Thanks, e. I’ve been really starting to catch on to your second point about the inconsistency of Mexican teams being a result of player movement. It dawned on me the other day that the Mexican league (and others like MLS in the U.S.) is like a minor-league baseball team. Its really great players are going to move up to the major leagues in Europe, and the rest can be involved in trades and other machinations.
The challenge for me has been to figure out how to root for teams that have completely different rosters from year to year. My experience as a sports fan comes from rooting for U.S. basketball, football and baseball teams, and every season, my team either progresses closer to its goal of a championship or further away, but always with the knowledge that most players will be back the following year and that there’s some sort of overall narrative for the team – a “rebuilding year,” a “playoff team on the bubble,” whatever.
Rooting for a minor-league baseball team is a different experience. You go to a game for fun, have a hot dog and a beer, but you’re really not that concerned with who wins because it doesn’t matter. A good team will lose its best players, sometimes in the middle of a season. No one watches the standings. It’s just a night’s entertainment for everyone except a handful of diehards.
That’s clearly not what’s happening in Mexican soccer, and I’m trying to find a way to adapt. It still seems to me that there should be teams that are better recruiters or evaluators of talent who would show more success over time, kind of like how it works in college sports in the U.S. But it really seems to be luck of the draw, and I’m having trouble figuring out how to develop passion for a team that’s just winning because it’s lucky to have the best players among a group of second-tier professional athletes.
The fact that different teams win every year is a strength. It’s not like boring La Liga or Serie A or the Scottish Premier league where the same 2 teams are at the top every year. MLS has also been like this, but since it gives all it’s good designated player money to LA Galaxy and New York Red Bulls, it is heading toward also having the same two teams win every year.
Hm, yeah, I see your point, and parity can definitely be a good thing. (Exhibit A: The NFL.) I think what bothers me is the reason a different team is winning every year (or more precisely twice a year). Unlike the NFL, there’s very little consistency in team personnel because the Mexican league is essentially a minor soccer league that loses its best players to the majors every year. (This is also true for MLS.)
Like for instance if I’m a Chicago Bears fan, which I am, I can say, “We have the best defensive line in the world, and we’ve got them under contract for years, and all we need now is a quarterback and some good drafting on the offensive line and we’re set.” And I can see if management makes that happen, and if they do, then the team probably makes the playoffs, and then we have a shot. And if not there are more holes to fill and we see how the offseason goes, and there’s tinkering and sometimes overhauls, but the best players are locked up in contracts as long as possible and you get to know them and love them and root for them to win.
I don’t feel like that idea of team-building, of a process, is there in Mexican soccer because the player movement is all too haphazard. A team basically wins because it managed to have the best team possible whose players were not good enough to get signed by better leagues. Is that a misreading?
Mexican soccer is CORRUPT.HORRIBLE REFEREES.Mexican Soccer in General is Bullshit!Not what it used to be!When America and Chivas were the big ones!Now its Pumas?Monterrey?….Im Mexican I watch America every week (Im 100% Americanista!)And I hate how Mexican soccer has changed year by year!-_- I recommend you dont get into Mexican soccer…I only watch America in the FMF .The only soccer League I enjoy is La Liga(Spanish League)
First off why is there 2 tournments instead of one because of money and a valuable regular season for example 17 games untill play-offs this will make teams play there best from the start to end unlike MLS where there’s like 36 tedious dull games in the regular season and more than half of the league teams qualify with means medicore teams are in
The reason there’s 2 tournments instead of 1 is because of money and a vaulable regular season for example 17 games untill playoffs this means players will try there best from start to finish. MLS has “36” dull tedious regular season games then more than half of the teams qualify for the playoffs this just encourages medicorcy. NFL can’t do this since its a foreign concept but I believe it will work wonders here in the States/Canada. To be updated on the standings and games just look it online since the US media doesn’t even mention it. And chivas are still around because it produces quality players because of the league itself soccer is the number one sport. I would like Toronto FC to field only Canadians they suck already but atleast they will have pride in their team and in the near furture have great players national team wise.
And the reason teams are inconsistant because of parity in the mexican soccer league that is something to admire like in bundesliga unlike the duopoly in Spain. Teams there hold on good players most of the time unlike mls where they keep trading after trade its hard to go for a team if the roster keeps changing doesn’t let fans grow around the players.