Nate Bukaty

We need to appeal to soccer fans first before we worry about people that don't even like it.

And then grow soccer fans.

The point being is like,

okay, what difference can a guy make or can an enterprise make, can a sporting event make?

If Lamar Hunt doesn't fall in love with those three things in 1963, what is this town right now?

If the Chiefs don't move here, what is this town right now?

You know, the World Cup's not here.

The World Cup's not even in America.

That league that they thought was going to fold and had three guys owning ten teams in the league.

they only bought those teams to keep the league afloat.

You know, he wasn't because he wanted to, but that's how much he believed in it.

And by the way, another recurring theme about Kansas City, the pioneer phrase we use a decent amount, from Lewis and Clark to Walt Disney to the guys that started Cerner and Lamar, all these, this idea of, you know, to be a pioneer, you almost have to believe in something that everyone else thinks is a folly, right?

And that even is proven to you as a fault.

Yeah.

And Lamar loved to call his AFL group the foolish club and all that.

And so I just think this enterprise, if we do it right, if we lean into it, if we embrace it, has a chance to be the kind of thing that 30 years from now we're saying, man, what would this city be like if we hadn't had that World Cup to kick off all these other things that are happening now?

And that's what I hope it really is.

It's like that scene from Monty Python when the guy's running into the church, you know, Sir Lancelot, and it looks like he's 100 yards away over and over and over and over again, and then all of a sudden he's right there.

That's what I feel like this World Cup is.

I was thinking it was more like the French guy on the wall going... Yeah, well, there's definitely French people taunting us right now.