By Evan Weiner |
While Major League Baseball, the National Football League, the National Basketball Association and the National Hockey League continue to export their North American product globally, there is one sports group that does not want to step foot in America: Soccer or football players who are part of Spain’s La Liga.
It seems the Spanish professional football league has its eyes set on America and to that end, it has partnered with a marketing group to stage a handful of matches in America during a 15 year period starting in 2019. The players are so against the notion that they are talking about staging a strike. It is not as if America doesn’t embrace international football, Americans support it. There is a market and some of the biggest names in the football industry have opened United States offices with the main goal of marketing global football brands to American consumers. The English Premiership has a TV deal in the United States. The Spanish players are unhappy that they were not consulted in the decision making. The North American sports leagues are partners with players in global expansion.
The Spanish league may have a team, Barcelona, and a date, January 27, 2019, in mind but nothing happens without the players saying yes and that could happen with financial incentives. Meanwhile, Major League Baseball, which does provide a financial incentive for its players to perform outside of the United States and Canada, has scheduled its 2019 international games. Seattle and Oakland will play regular season games in Tokyo on March 20 and 21st. Japan has had a long history of hosting American baseball players’ tours and regular season games. MLB will have two pre-season and four regular season games in Monterrey, Mexico and is sending the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox to London, England for two games next June. Sports owners want to sell more t-shirts.
This article was republished with permission from the original publisher, Evan Weiner.