The Athletic

so apparently the athletic MLS soccer coverage gonna change, a few beat writers were let go and the focus will be more regional. well see, for me the MLS and soccer stuff was a plus but not really what i got it for.

I guess we were ahead of the curve when they let Araos go and Dyer covers both NY teams. And it has led to less coverage. Have to wonder if they add New England and/or the Union to his plate.
 
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I guess we were ahead of the curve when they let Araos go and Dyer covers both NY teams. And it has led to less coverage. Have to wonder if they add New England and/or the Union to his plate.

apparently all soccer coverage has slowed down. i dont really notice it since im already following football, baseball, basketball stories already and there were always alot more of those.
 
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apparently all soccer coverage has slowed down. i dont really notice it since im already following football, baseball, basketball stories already and they were always alot more of those.
I'm undecided what to do. I only loosely follow baseball and football, and everything else even less. So I appreciate their mainstream sports coverage a bit -- they have good writers. But I got the subscription because they had the best MLS coverage by far. The problem is, even though it just got much worse, they still do.
 
apparently all soccer coverage has slowed down
They made their announcement today about Athletic podcasts, and none of the podcasts at launch is about soccer. I was especially disappointed with this because the Athletic's soccer editor is George Quarishi and his old Dummy podcast was one of my very favorite soccer podcasts.
 
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They made their announcement today about Athletic podcasts, and none of the podcasts at launch is about soccer. I was especially disappointed with this because the Athletic's soccer editor is George Quarishi and his old Dummy podcast was one of my very favorite soccer podcasts.
Ugh. Think I’ve yelled about my not so much love for George. I won’t go into it again, but he represents a lot of what I don’t much care for among all of the mainstream US soccer media.

Anyway, the Athletic, as I've said before, is a massive disappointment. I won’t be renewing. Total bust for me. Far better stuff out there if you dig a little.
 
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Ugh. Think I’ve yelled about my not so much love for George. I won’t go into it again, but he represents a lot of what I don’t much care for among all of the mainstream US soccer media.

Anyway, the Athletic, as I've said before, is a massive disappointment. I won’t be renewing. Total bust for me. Far better stuff out there if you dig a little.
What's the deal with George?

I still like the Athletic's cross-league coverage. Mostly @joeincleats tactical highlights actually.
 
Ugh. Think I’ve yelled about my not so much love for George. I won’t go into it again, but he represents a lot of what I don’t much care for among all of the mainstream US soccer media.

Anyway, the Athletic, as I've said before, is a massive disappointment. I won’t be renewing. Total bust for me. Far better stuff out there if you dig a little.
I got it for the soccer coverage, but that been a massive letdown tbh. Even Araos' articles were meh when he was writing for them, before getting released/fired. However, it gave me more input to hockey, so I'm probably going to keep it for that. Love the writers for the hockey articles.

Sucks that soccer coverage is still eh in the US from a writing standpoint.
 
What's the deal with George?

I still like the Athletic's cross-league coverage. Mostly @joeincleats tactical highlights actually.
For brevity: seems like a guy who likes to sniff his own farts. When he “sticks to sports”, his work in a vacuum is pretty good.

And yeah, Joe is a sparkling bright spot. Reddy is good, but she puts all her better stuff out via joe.co.
 
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The Athletic is "doubling the size" of its soccer staff.

"Today we are announcing the addition of five more staff writers. It seems hard to believe, but I’m pretty sure this makes us the largest employer of full-time soccer journalists ever to cover the game here in the U.S. and Canada."
https://theathletic.com/925601/2019/04/15/we-are-doubling-the-size-of-our-full-time-soccer-staff/
The comments are fascinating, and for the most part, not in the shit show sort of way that comments often are.
 
Paul Tenorio: "I'll be jumping on Periscope here in a few minutes to chat about this more. Please join."
Over and over.
That was weak, but the comments prompting that were usually well made, with discussions of the loss of local reporters, and debates about whether the emphasis on MLS is too much (not IMO), or should be adjusted to USL and USL.
 
I just sent this email to The Athletic

I subscribed because you had a dedicated beat writer for NYCFC. Then you fired him (or he quit - it was kind of opaque), and Kristian Dyer did his best to cover both RBNY and NYCFC. But then you fired more MLS beat writers and made a splashy announcement that you hired a bunch of national writers for extensive MLS coverage. Fine, but there has not been a single dedicated NYCFC article since April 4 almost 6 weeks ago. In that time the club ended a 20 game streak of terrible play that extended to last summer, added a key new player, changed their primary formation, and moved several spots up the table. And still not one story about the team, just some brief mentions in league-wide roundups.
That's not worth paying for. I just added a tickler to my calendar to remind me to cancel a few days before my sub expires in mid-June, and it will take more than one article and a couple more passing references to change my mind.

I understand the economics and the place MLS holds in the US sports landscape. I don't begrudge you your choices. But they have costs, and I'm just providing the info for you.​
 
I just sent this email to The Athletic

I subscribed because you had a dedicated beat writer for NYCFC. Then you fired him (or he quit - it was kind of opaque), and Kristian Dyer did his best to cover both RBNY and NYCFC. But then you fired more MLS beat writers and made a splashy announcement that you hired a bunch of national writers for extensive MLS coverage. Fine, but there has not been a single dedicated NYCFC article since April 4 almost 6 weeks ago. In that time the club ended a 20 game streak of terrible play that extended to last summer, added a key new player, changed their primary formation, and moved several spots up the table. And still not one story about the team, just some brief mentions in league-wide roundups.
That's not worth paying for. I just added a tickler to my calendar to remind me to cancel a few days before my sub expires in mid-June, and it will take more than one article and a couple more passing references to change my mind.

I understand the economics and the place MLS holds in the US sports landscape. I don't begrudge you your choices. But they have costs, and I'm just providing the info for you.​
Great stuff. I've been meaning to do the exact same thing. Very disappointing how little coverage there has been.