How to win over friends and fam to Sporting KC this New Year

With apologies to John Winston Lennon:

‘So, this is the New Year. And what has Sporting Kansas City done? Another (abysmal) year over, and a new one just begun.’

Wait. Rip the needle off the record.

The holidays are supposed to be smiles, especially the hope of a new year.

Although your friends and family perhaps have also been mourning the current state of the other major teams in Kansas City: Patrick Mahomes tore his ACL; the highly favored Current bowed out early in the playoffs; and the Royals teased a playoff run but drifted to mid. There is joy on the horizon.

The true gift still hidden under the now fading tree (or in its drooping boughs), the true toast of triumph for 2026, will be Sporting Kansas City. There is only one way to go after four successive losing seasons and the capitulation to a last place finish in the Western Conference last season after just missing the dubious honor in 2024: Up.

Following are 11 points of pride (or something of the like) to pull your saddened friends into the orbit of Sporting Kansas City fandom. Heck, ultra-fandom!

1. Buy low; Sell high: Disclaimer: This is no way should be taken as advice on betting or your finances or an endorsement of sports betting. Besides, I mean tickets. Seats at Children’s Mercy Park the place where Sporting Kansas City plays are there for the taking. Getting in when the team is flailing only means higher re-sell value when the inevitable rise gains steam. It’s kind of like real estate… only not really at all.
2. They are true Kansas Citians (with no stadium drama): Their stadium is already in Kansas! But they straddle the state line like true Kansas Citians who know the best Mexican food (and Sporting’s training facility) is in Kansas City, Kansas, but the best BBQ is in… damn. Okay, the biggest and best things to do (and Sporting’s No Other Pub and headquarters) are in Missouri.

3. Players become pioneers: This club historically has big personas who know the game well. It is amazing how many former Kansas City Wizards/Sporting Kansas City players have pushed the league forward from positions of power and leadership or influence. Prominent among them are former Wizards Garth Lagerway and Chris Henderson who helped MLS grow into maturity as executives. Both are currently with Atlanta United but have also worked in various stints for Inter Miami, Seattle Sounders, and Real Salt Lake.Chris Klein, Brian Bliss, Frank Klopas, Diego Gutierrez (the only soccer player not named Pele to be inducted into World Sports Humanitarian Hall of Fame), and current SKC Sporting Director Mike Burns all have held similar positions. The list of former players who have been or are head coaches or assistant coaches in MLS includes Eric Quill, Josh Wolff, Paulo Nagamura, Aurelien Collin, Jimmy Nielsen, Davy Arnaud, Preki, Dave van den Bergh, Mike Sorber, Brian Johnson, Wolde Harris, Eric Erichmann, and, of course, longtime Sporting Kansas City coaches Kerry Zavagnin and Peter Vermes, one of the most successful coaches in MLS history. Lastly, Herculez Gomez, Alexi Lalas, Tony Meola, and Jimmy Conrad are either announcers/commentators or prominent soccer/MLS podcasters.

What does former Sporting Kansas City player enter name here do now? A lot.     

4. Charming loyalty: Ah, loyalty. Someone loves someone or something so much they stand by and support no matter what.

Give a long-term, significantly more than modest contract to a player who is a loyal servant? Sure. Or stick with a player well past his stale date and get nothing in return? Of course. Or stick with a head coach for, oh, I don’t know, 17 years – far beyond what any other club would do? Most definitely. It’s charming, really.

Until it isn’t. Never mind that player often was not very good. Or that player would have brought market value three to five years earlier. Or everyone beyond the club knew a change was needed three to six years before change was made.

But here is the crux… Sporting Kansas City will be loyal and persistent in getting you, the fan, in, or back. Because in a smaller market within a league with no NBA or MLB-sized TV revenue, they depend on you.

5. More titles than all: Two MLS Cup Championships. Three Conference Championships. Four U.S. Open Cups. This club was winning trophies when the Chiefs were Gunther Cunningham and then 1^st year Andy Reid, when the Royals were Tony Muser and then Ned Yost. In fact, one could argue Sporting Kansas City began the golden age of Kansas City sports with their 2013 MLS Cup.

Sporting will rise again… they just had to let the other teams in town borrow the spotlight for a while.

6. Edge of innovation: When Livestrong Sporting Park (as it was then named) opened in 2011, it became the template for stadium design as soccer specific stadiums proliferated across the country. The recent additions of lights and a scoreboard capable of presenting a new fan experience have upped the ante. Sporting splashed the first cash in a cash for player trade for high-scoring forward Dejan Joveljic last season and were the first club in MLS to sign a free agent in 2015. All expected from majority owners who led innovations in the medical software industry at Cerner.

So, they missed out on MLS 2.5 to 3.0 or whatever – buying young starlets and selling players abroad, becoming a significant player (in MLS standards) on the world player market, and growing a strong academy to feed the first team. Apparently, Sporting does not want to be a party to something they did not first do. So, potential!?! Hiring David Lee, a mind with an entrepreneurial spirit, as the president of soccer operations and general manager is a step back into the spirit of innovation.

7. Heartland boys at the center: There is nothing better than talented guys from the Midwest being at the heart of your favorite team. Matt Besler and Seth Sinovic were two at the heart of the run to five trophies between 2012 and 2017. And let’s not forget prominent players like Chris Klein, Matt McKeon, and Mike Sorber who hailed from the Midwest. Now, Jansen Miller and Jacob Bartlett lead a stable of talented youth.

And with a current roster of only 17 players, there will be at least another eight athletic youth signed before the season kicks off February 21, maybe even some more local boys… I mean, Match, Hinge, Bumble, forget’em. Just go to a Sporting Kansas City game.

8. As a Sporting Kansas City fan, you are really easy to shop for: Whether someone is shopping for you or you are shopping for something yourself, just trudge past the massive amounts of garb for other teams and the St. Louis merch from the return bin to find the Sporting stuff. There won’t be much. Just pick one item – no deliberation necessary, or even possible – and you’re done!
9. Singular celebrations: The moment Digital Takawira did the ‘Digital crawl’ at Arrowhead in the Kansas City Wiz’s opening match April 13, 1996, the club claimed the goal celebration crown. And there have been many classics since: Just pull up Benny Feilhaber’s top goals video (the “wonder shrug” after a beautiful free kick is my favorite) or see Krisztian Nemeth’s lightning bolt or Erik Thommy’s arrow slinger or Gianluca Busio’s slide (captured so well by our own Thad Bell) or Kei Kamara’s heart hands.

But the all-time classic was Kamara and CJ Sapong’s St. Patrick’s Day themed celebration in 2012.

What memorable goal celebrations will arise in the new era? Whatever they may be, may they be amidst guttural roars from an enlivened fanbase.

10. Dedicated to giving: Founded in 2013, The Victory Project – Sporting’s charitable wing – has supported children with cancer and made soccer available to all via a wide variety of programs that support the community both financially and emotionally. The activities also include players regularly visiting pediatric patients and hosting them at training. And at each match, a child who is or has battled cancer is honored.

11. Iconic (and bloody) moments: Giving all for the fans, for the club, for each other makes a team a club. That dedication and fight is on full display in Sporting lore. Logan Ndenbe tore his ACL in a 2023 playoff match versus St. Louis CITY but scored a goal and played another 40 minutes anyway. Paulo Nagamura suffered a deep cut to his face in the 2012 Open Cup Final and went on to score in the fateful shootout. Jimmy Nielsen played in goal with broken ribs in the bitter cold to become a hero in the 2013 MLS Cup final. Want actually fighting spirit? Witness Jake Davis fight and frustrate CITY’s Joao Klauss in St. Louis, Shapi Suleymanov stand up to CITY’s Celio Pompeu and make him look ridiculous, and Zorhan Bassong confront FC Dallas’s Paul Arriola after Arriola throws the ball at Bassong’s head.

The most iconic moment came in the 2000 Western Conference Final at Arrowhead when Mo Johnston took a boot to the head (que splattering blood) to flick a header onto Miklos Molnar for the playoff series winner to make it to MLS Cup 2000. Said Johnston reflecting in 2017: “At the end of the day, if it’s costing you a broken nose and 19 stitches, who cares?” Classic fight.

Now, you are equipped to boldly win over your friends and family downtrodden by the current state of Kansas City sports. The reasons to love Sporting Kansas City are many. For Sporting Kansas City and its fans, joy in the new year will be a NEW year with a new head coach (announcement imminent), the rumor of a new majority owner, and David Lee constructing essentially a whole new roster.

Sporting Kansas City currently has only 17 players on the roster and no new head coach before players report for medicals January 10. That’s in 10 days. So what? They couldn’t get it wrong for another year, could they? Nah. That is the true optimism of a new year.

Sure, there will be some bumps in the rebuilding road – Kansas Citians are used to that – but the organization is resolute in its drive to climb back to prominence. Like any resolution, the club will find itself during the journey.

Then, both fans who adopt the club now and those who have stuck it out can say they were Sporting Kansas City fans before being a Sporting Kansas City fan was cool. Again.