Furball, don't worry about it if some people can't appreciate soccer.
GoFaster the issue isn't how to advertise during the soccer game in America, it's the fact that the ratings for the game are low. Advertising in soccer is actually more effective than in say football because you're actually seeing the ads while watching the game not during commercials when you might change to another game, go to the bathroom, or get another beer from the fridge. Overseas, the teams have a sponsor on the front of their jerseys, here it's on the back. Yup, MLS jerseys have sponsors on them, for example New England has Pespi on their jerseys and San Jose has yahoo sports (well, last year they did, dunno about this year, I'll let you know after Saturday when they play DC on ABC.) Plus, the entire field is ringed with billboards. Actually, come to think of it, hockey rinks do this as well. ESPN also has sponors that "bring you the game action commercial free." The announcers every 5 or 10 minutes mention the current sponsor and you see that sponsor's logo by the displayed score/time remaining in the upper corner of your TV. The problem comes from the fact that the average MLS game on espn2 doesn't pull the ratings that the average MLB game will pull on espn on Wed and Sunday nights. Of course Budweiser is going to pay epsn more to advertise during MLB than MLS.
Best hope for American soccer is already in place, and it's MLS along with seeing Americans do well overseas. It gives kids someone to look up to playing that sport. We're already starting to see some of that. Landon Donovan, DaMarcus Beasley and Bobby Convey were all about 11 and 12 when we hosted the World Cup in 1994. They saw Tab Ramos, Alexi Lalas and others take on the world and advance out of group play. Two years later they saw a professional league start up here at home. They said "I can get paid to play my sport!" They saw Brad Friedel leave MLS to go to England. Now they are playing in MLS and on the National team. Now you've got Freddy Adu, a 14 year old kid about to make his pro debut. He's been on talk shows, Sports Illustrated and even 60 Minutes. The youth playing soccer have people to look up to here, and not just overseas. Ten years ago, we didn't have that here. For the USA to be in the top 20 in the world in the FIFA rankings, for us to finish in the top 8 in World Cup 2002 is damn impressive considering that our top flight professional league isn't even in its 10th season yet.
I doubt that the USA will ever win a World Cup in my lifetime. There have been 17 World Cups, and only 7 Nations have won them (Brazil 5, Germany 3, Italy 3, Argentina 2, Uruguay 2, England 1, France 1) and only 4 other nations have ever played in the Finals (Czechoslovakia 2, Hungary 2, Holland 2, Sweden 1.) It's extraordinarly hard to make it to the Championship game, let alone win it. We just don't have the history of the sport here to have the rabid fan base which would support the domestic leagues with gobs of liquid cash which would draw the best athletes to play soccer. Just imagine Michael Vick as a striker for the US Men's Team if he had played soccer all of his life. But, soccer has to share the spotlight here with four other mainstream sports, and it's 5th out of 5 here. In Europe, it competes with rugby and cricket (and basketball in some areas) but it's #1 out of all those sports. If US Soccer was as popular and well supported as the NFL, then the US Men's team would consistently challenge for the World Cup. It's not, so to make the Quarterfinals of WC 2002 and play VERY well against the 2002 runner up is highly commendable for our country.
