Posted on 08/08/2005 11:22:35 AM PDT by onja
mods-If this isn't in the right place please move or cut it.
Why do most Americans hate soccer? It's not just that they don't like it. They are actively against it.
Soccer takes more skill and endurance than the other sports. In middle and high school you take a beating.(Elbowed, tripped, kicked, tackled- All done fairly or behind the ref's back and without body armor) There are many tactics decided by the players(unlike football and baseball). It's a sport many different people can do. Not just people who are huge or work out daily at the gym. Fast people, skilled people, strong people(fullbacks), tall people(goaly), small people, smart people. Footballers don't need much skill. Mainly strength. baseball doesn't need too much skill. Mainly the basics(throwing and catching) and strength. And, seriously, why does everyone think soccer players are gay, weak, etc? They aren't. In middle school half the team played another school sport. All of the highschoolers could easily have played school football or basketball. Out of the hundreds of players I've played I've never seen one who was even acted at all gay.
Those are the kind I can't stand (see: Ted Turner, James Carville), probably because I'm from the South.
It's like, "dang, did you learn nothing while you were living here?"
You left off "penalty kick wins it at the end!!!!!". Happens all the time.
Also, soccer is a game where you primarily use half of your body. Just can't get excited over it.
So what do you call this? A header?
Disagree. Hockey has the most skill and endurance. And you'd be surprised at the endurace level in football - and the skills needed in football are immense for all the positions. Backpeddle, weave, open technique, stalk block, stalk punch, pursuit angle, tip drill.
There are many tactics decided by the players(unlike football and baseball).
You just stepped into a hole there.
Football is the most tactical sport out there(maybe baseball can match). On Defense alone, there are multiple formations 4-3, 3-4, 46, Nickel, Dime, Goaline. Then there are the coverage. Man coverage, Cover 2, 3, 4 zones, blitzes, and everything else.
On Offense there are dozens of formations, and dozens more variants. It's a lot more complicated that "run and pass".
It's a sport many different people can do. Not just people who are huge or work out daily at the gym.
I'm not a big guy, and I was able to play football(granted I did hit the gym back then). Footballers don't need much skill. Mainly strength.
ROFL. Strength is only one aspect. Strength, speed, agility, and most of all - smarts matter.
And, seriously, why does everyone think soccer players are gay, weak, etc? They aren't.
I never seen more whining over a scratch injury in my life than when I saw part of soccer game. (Granted, the USA team is better than most on that) That made me sick to see. Get up and back into the play. Hell, Chris Spielman played linebacker(toughest position in the game IMO) every day one season with a torn pectorial. I think that has a lot of do with the weak and gay references.
Exactly. We all have our own opinions was my point Insure.
I think its really funny though when a soccer guy tries to explain to a non-soccer guy that soccer really is cool.
"you run the whole time, there is a lot of defensive manuevering going on, the clock never stops, and you don't need any equipment!"
I just don't get how that is fun.
LOL. I'm at a loss for words.
If I want to listen to traffic reports, I can get that during rush hour on weekdays.
Ok, funny picture... but you'd cover those gonads, too, if you were expected to stand there and take a hit from a large, relatively hard ball rocketing at you from 10 yards at over 60 MPH.
One last closing remark. You can't say that soccer is just some rich, Euro trash game since it's played even more in third world countries. It's not just Europe. It's the world.
Thanks everyone;)
Slow-pitch softball, or fast-pitch hardball? What was your batting average? What position did you play?
I like Canadian hockey and American footballs.
Leafs and Packers; them's my boys.
I find baseball and especially soccer dull. Baseball because it's less action packed and soccer because it's a largely uneventfun endurance game. Also, the players aren't as cool.
YELLOW CARD! You can't use your hand in soccer.
Only in single-elimination tournament matches. League or group play allows draws to stay as draws, though introducing a reformed points system that awards 3 points for a win (instead of 2) and only 1 for a draw about a decade ago has led to a lot less settling for draws.
Now, overtime silliness can be better described as the NHL's 4-on-4 followed by shootout nonsense. Or NCAAF's trading possessions from the 25-yard-line BS. What is so devastating about letting a (non-single-elimination) game end in a tie at the end of regulation?
Psh. I didn't even put golf in there. Forget atheleticism, strength, endurance and everything but skill, because golf is the hardest sport of all. And some people don't call it a sport beleive it or not.
I play twice a week in the summer and I've not broken 80 but twice---and that was 2 years ago. At my age, it may never happen again.
Anyone who thinks golf isn't a sport should try to hit a ball that must go under a tree and over a bunker to a tight pin. People who can pull it off make millions for a reason.
Red card, actually, if he intentionally used that hand. ;)
A guy I went to high school with set records in baseball. He was compared to Derek Jeter. He was a two sport(football/baseball) player splitting time between college and the minors. In college he excelled in football, but in baseball, he couldn't make it out of the minors because of the curveball. He's now a backup QB in the NFL.
Maybe, but cheerleaders!
Where the heck did that come from? But I totally agree. Ride on the freakin' sidewalk if there's traffic, people like me that drive cars (like normal Americans) don't like having to focus so much on some jackhole wearing a yellow spandex suit and "them lil' ol' shorty-shorts." I have to make sure you Lance-Armstrong never-gonna-be's don't get crushed under the weight of my Cherokee if you fall, so I have to slow down, and drive close to the OTHER LANE.
The Critical Mass hippies are another story. The spandex bike queens annoy me, but those folks make me homicidal. Blocking faster car traffic because you want to make a statement is both dangerous to you and other road users, and it's so rude it's indescribable.
At least scooter drivers burn hydrocarbons like normal folk.
ff
Were you allowed to use your hands?
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