Posted on 06/26/2010 8:07:11 PM PDT by Chet 99
Friday, June 25, 2010 1:11 AM EDT
As you know, we are all in the grip of World Cup fever.
It's reached such intensity that if you walk into a sports bar anywhere in the United States and mention Landon Donavan's stunning extra-time goal against Algeria that allowed the USA to finish atop group C and advance to this weekend's round of 16, literally several people will actually know what you're talking about.
And only a couple will want to beat you up.
The World Cup is, of course, that quadrennial event when the entire sporting world can join together as one and revel in the joy of pointing out how stupid the Americans are for hating soccer.
But Americans don't hate soccer. We also don't hate haggis, or warm beer, or eating snails or invading Poland or any of the other things that Europeans like to do. We just don't think about them much. (OK, to be perfectly accurate, Glenn Beck DOES hate soccer and the World Cup, accusing the rest of the world trying to "shove it down our throats." Evidently someone told him it is a game played by foreigners.)
But, you may say, America's performance in World Cup play this month has drawn decent ratings for the telecasts and certainly must be inspiring a whole new generation of fans.
To that I say, someone has been blowing a vuvuzela too close to your head. Americans will happily watch our athletes every four years in the Olympics, too. That doesn't mean that women's gymnastics or luge is going to become the Next Big Thing In Sports. (Heck, if they only have to do it every four years, Americans will even get kind of excited about watching curling.)
Soccer has been the official Next Big Thing for about the last 35 years. Professional leagues have risen and fallen, great stars of the game - who may have seen better days -have been imported and now our national team is rising through the top ranks of world competition.
And American soccer still hasn't broken the glass ceiling that, in most polls, puts it just below horseracing and just above lacrosse.
This is despite the fact that every suburban child in America is required - by law - to participate in a soccer league at some point in his or her life. This is how most of us become acquainted with soccer, watching our kids cluster around a ball - at least the ones who aren't standing at random points around the field, contemplating dandelions - their little legs flailing, until one kid does the only logical thing and picks up the ball and RUNS with it.
It makes you think, "Gee, a warm beer would taste great about now."
TOM REILLY is a Sun Chronicle news editor and former soccer dad whose daughters have moved on to more interesting - and expensive - pursuits. He can be reached at 508-236-0332 or at treilly@thesunchronicle.com. Read his blog at thesunchronicle.com/reilly.
“...just below horseracing and just above lacrosse.”
I think horseracing has slipped well behind lacrosse and soccer, and is now in the curling range.
I never got the fever I am an American I’m immune
Having seen a World Cup game in person in Dallas in 1994, I can tell you I came away convinced. Soccer is a captivating sport.
If any sport is boring and tedious by comparison... its Major League Baseball. Most pro baseball players can play a whole game and not even break a sweat.
“Soccer? Even curling is more exciting to watch.”
Hardly.
Baseball, the great all-American game, is quite boring to watch.
Soccer, for all its flaws, is a hell of a lot more interesting to watch than baseball or golf.
Oh yeah, forgot about golf, and darts. Takes one hell of an athlete to smoke a butt and then sink a put or down a pint then toss a little dart at a board.
For me it’s NBA Basketball.
Kobe makes a twenty-footer
Kobe makes another twenty-footer
Kobe makes another twenty-footer
ad nauseum...
And every game comes down to the last two minutes, and that two-minutes takes a half an hour with all of the time outs.
I agree that baseball is boring. I no longer watch it, not even the world series. But I agree with this article: Americans' interest in soccer every four years does not at all mean that it is about to become a popular, major spectator sport every year.
And as someone else said, these hundreds of thousands of American kids who play soccer do not become soccer fans as adults. There have been surveys to verify that.
Soccer will be played at all levels in the US, but won't become on par with football, baseball and basketball as a spectator sport.
And, I have two questions for anyone:
1. When is the soccer season? What months of the year?
2. How many games do pro teams here and in Europe play per season, and per week?
European soccer leagues go from late August through May.
The English Premier League, which is the league I follow, has games usually on Saturday and Sunday. What's great is that since they are about five hours ahead, their games take place in the morning here, and usually end right when the football games start.
The MLS is a joke. It's like watching Single-A baseball.
Immigration, legal and illegal, will make soccer on a par with basketball, baseball, and football.
Thanks, and man, that is a long season. Almost nine months. I knew it seemed like those European teams were always playing, month-after-month, when I'd check sports on Justin TV.
English teams, have the Premier League, then they have the Carling Cup, FA Cup, and then on top of that, the best teams have the European competitions, going on, and they occur concurrently.
So in one week, a team can play a Premier League game, an FA Cup match, then a Champions League game. All in all, the best teams can play up to 50-60 games in a season, in all of the different competitions.
Probably in a few states, but not nationwide in the forseeable future. And many immigrants begin participating in the more popular American sports.
the infamous Kaka bump, yep.
Why not just spot the two teams 100 points and play 2 minutes :-)
Soccer? Only thing exciting about it are the hooligans.
Funner watching green bananas turning yellow or better yet, watching mothballs evaporate.
Soccer is in their blood. They can play other sports and still love soccer. Steve Nash and Kobe Bryant are in South Africa attending the cup events. Bryant was raised overseas in Italy. Nash played soccer. (I know Nash is a Canadian) Every state is a border state when it comes to immigrants.
Just one reason why La Crosse is a lot more exciting to watch. The guys go at it like a hockey match-- very rough and lots of mayhem.
The women are grace and strategy. The refs are a lot quicker to blow the whistle on any roughness, but still there's a lot more action than soccer.
I am 35 years old. If soccer becomes a popular sport in America at any point in my lifetime, I’ll literally eat my hat.
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