Columbus is constantly referred to as a “college sports town” both by residents as well as outsiders who know little about Columbus outside of the fact that it is the home of the Buckeyes. While the last decade has given us the rise of two major league teams (the NHL Columbus Blue Jackets and the MLS Columbus Crew) many locals still laugh at the notion of soccer and hockey being real “major league” sports.
While it is true that baseball, football, and basketball are still the top three national pastimes in America, what I think many fail to acknowledge is the international appeal of these other two games that Columbus is home to. Soccer is widely regarded as the most popular sport in the world, and while ice hockey might be a bit further down the list, it’s still got a big following in the colder regions of the world who don’t quite have the climate for year-round soccer.
What does this mean for Columbus? Not a lot when we have losing teams. But as it’s been mentioned in the news the past few weeks, the MLS Cup was broadcast and watched the world over. To have our Columbus Crew competing, winning, and well supported by our local fans is a huge day in the spotlight for our city on the global stage. The same could be said for the Blue Jackets whenever they manage to find their time in the spotlight.
I don’t think we’ll see “the tide turning” anytime soon. College sports will continue to attract more locals to tune in for quite some time to come. Just keep it in the back of your mind that while scarlet and gray apparel continues to outsell black and gold, our real major league sports teams are busy making Columbus a global city that could potentially draw new international citizens and businesses to relocate to a place where their interests can be welcomed too.
Columbus: Warm Enough for Futbol, Cold enough for Hockey
This post and sentiment is in complete synchronicity with a lecture to which I listened via podcast on the way to work this morning.
In it, the lecturer, Richard Florida, author of The Rise of the Creative Class bemoans the effects of the PATRIOT Act and the increase in immigration controls, keeping more people out of the United States. What we should be doing is allowing MORE immigrants and visitors into the US, and widening our creative pool.
The lecture is an hour long, but I’ll summarize as much as possible. I highly recommend you listen to it, though. It’s a great explanation of why Columbus is succeeding when cities like Cleveland and Cincinnati are failing.
Basically, the idea that simply fostering high-tech business in cities where manufacturing jobs are going to the wayside is not working. The new “Creative Class” (artists, designers, computer professionals, engineers, etc.) are not attracted to companies nearly as much as they are attracted to places. Cities with reputations for open-mindedness, intellectual diversity, appreciation for arts and culture, and the like are much more attractive to the purveyors of the new post-manufacturing economy than cities that are simply trying to attract people to high-tech jobs.
Look at cities like Seattle, Boston, San Francisco, and even Columbus. Vibrant cultural centers do more to attract the newer movers and shakers of the business world than do cities like Pittsburgh, Des Moines, and even our own Cleveland and Cincinnati due to that very vibrancy.
How is this connected to the Crew and Blue Jackets? Like you said, Walker, sports like soccer and hockey are more international sports, and attract people from more diverse backgrounds than your simple football, basketball, and baseball. They have those sports in Cleveland and Cincinnati… yet Columbus is the one that’s growing. That sort of emphasis on worldliness is what’s making Columbus successful. Look also at our arts scene, the presence of a major university (which pulls in many foreign students), and our increasingly vibrant city culture. I think Florida would argue that those factors do more to pull in more talented people in new-economy type jobs than any amount of Chamber-of-Commerce planning might be doing.
Columbus blew the opportunity to celebrate and sell the city. We are number one at the world’s game and all we had was impromptu gubernatorial proclamation.