00:00We're fresh off the final, of course, and I'm sure you haven't had enough time to reflect on the experience
00:06overall.
00:06But when you think about the past few weeks, the past month or so, would you consider this World Cup
00:12a success?
00:14Oh, absolutely. By and large, I think when you look at the metrics, you know, fan engagement, obviously viewership,
00:20it's easily, you know, one of the best World Cups to date.
00:23And so for me as a former player, I was really excited to see, you know, how the U.S.
00:27and Canada and Mexico were able to organize the event.
00:30Quite flawlessly. Obviously, nothing's perfect. But over and all, I thought it was really, really good.
00:35And then to have the kind of crescendo last night in New York, it was it was really special and
00:39an ending to a great, great summer.
00:41It was in New Jersey. Let me just say that. Very true. Guilty. Guilty. It's OK.
00:47It's the same thing to the rest of the world here. But, you know, I we always talk about the
00:52halo effect that potentially a World Cup has on soccer in the U.S.
00:56when you think about the U.S. team moving through the rounds and you think about the World Cup being
01:01held in North America.
01:02What do you think that success looks like for MLS now that, you know, sadly, the World Cup is over?
01:09Yeah, I think the the biggest thing to focus on is like the last time we had this World Cup
01:14in 94, there was no professional league to fall back on.
01:17So consumers, new fans, they had nowhere to go to put all that energy. And now fast forward, you know,
01:2332 years and we have a domestic league that literally kicks off,
01:27you know, this week with with 15 to 30 games over the weekend. We have the League's Cup starting, which
01:32is a competition between MLS and League MX.
01:35So there's a ton of opportunity now for fans to kind of go and continue that excitement, continue that fandom
01:41and hopefully continue to kind of bring soccer to the forefront.
01:44Got to ask you about those controversial hydration breaks. So what do you think of them? Are they here to
01:52stay?
01:52FIFA claims it's for player welfare in the summer heat, but there were some criticisms that it was about, you
01:57know, introducing new ad slots.
01:59Yeah, I wasn't I'm not going to lie. I wasn't a fan. Look, I think there's obviously two sides to
02:05that.
02:05I think the first side is when you're playing in extreme temperatures, I think it's everybody's best interest to make
02:10sure the hydrated everything's,
02:12you know, the health and wellness of the players are number one. But in some cases in this tournament, we
02:16saw that really no need for a break.
02:18Right. The weather was fine. Some of the stadiums were indoor. So it kind of took a little bit of
02:24the life out of the game.
02:25And I think soccer is still a purist sport. So you want to see it be played as closely as
02:29possible to as designed.
02:31So depending on weather, I'm OK with it. But for the most part, we should probably keep it out of
02:35the game.
02:36When I was growing up, it was all about the halftime oranges. I don't know if they still do those.
02:40So, of course, while the tournament was deemed a success, including financially, was it a bit distracting or how distracting
02:47is it for players to have the kinds of political incidents and distractions that we saw this time?
02:53For example, with President Donald Trump's intervention with the one match ban for Follerin Balogun.
02:59Yeah, what happened with Balogun was was a bit unfortunate in the sense of, you know, everything that kind of
03:06happened around it, because I think it affected kind of how the team had to approach that game.
03:11I think it affected how Belgium then had to approach us. I think it gave them a little bit of
03:15extra fire.
03:16And so I understand the intention. I think it wasn't a red card, but I think the manner in which
03:21they arrived at that was pretty controversial and for good reason.
03:26So that part wasn't great. But beyond that, I was really proud of the team, really proud of how they
03:30competed, how they represented themselves, soccer in this country.
03:34And the viewership tells a story about, you know, people's intrigue and excitement about where the sport is today.
03:39Yeah, absolutely. And I do wonder, you think about the number of teams we have the most ever this year,
03:46I believe.
03:46Do you think that the tournament should expand to 64 teams from here?
03:51I think it's interesting. I think it's definitely worth exploring.
03:54I think the details here are the most important thing, because I think what made this World Cup so good
03:59is that the games were of quality, right?
04:01Everybody kind of felt like they were representing their countries, watching them being represented, but also feeling like the games
04:07were competitive.
04:08So I think that's something that you just have to, you know, be mindful of and make sure that if
04:12you do add teams, you're adding them in a way where competition stays high and that intrigue is still high.
04:17And I think that's what you have always in a World Cup. So you got to be careful with adding,
04:21you know, more twists and turns.
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