USWNT isn’t the feel-good story we’re told they are

Perhaps I’m a party-pooper by nature and nurture. When I was a kid I heard the music from the ice cream truck then excitedly asked my father for a quarter.

Unless you never heard that one, it’s an old one. Otherwise, it’s mine. But the risk of being condemned as a killjoy makes me defensive. “Our” team won, didn’t it? That’s what counts! USA! USA!

It’s a relentless insult: TV demands intelligent viewers ignore what they see to believe only what they’re told. Seconds after the US team won the Women’s World Cup on Sunday, Fox’s lead analyst Aly Wagner, former US World Cupper, gushed this:

“The way they’ve lifted a nation! The way they’ve lifted a gender! It’s something to behold! … They’ve done so much more and against all odds!” Was that for our ears or our pancakes?

Women’s Team Sports

There has been a great deal of discussion on why professional women’s team sports are not as popular as similar men’s team sports. Popular is defined by viewership, ticket sales and sponsorship. Much of the current analysis centers on the difference in the caliber of play that is displayed to the viewers. It has been said that spectators prefer the speed, agility and athleticism of men’s team sports and are willing to pay more to see such performance rather than a similar women’s competition. I think it goes deeper than that.

What follows is a comparative analysis of men and women’s team sports or one on one, face to face competition. Examples would be soccer, football, rugby, baseball, boxing, wrestling, etc. What is not being considered is individual time trial, scored or judged events such as swimming, track and field, golf, gymnastics, etc.

So…..the foundation ancient team sports were related to military training. The training was intended to give the soldiers the best chance of surviving and victory in battle. It included tactics, strategy and physical skills. The tactics included, introducing deception, creating fear, creating unequal advantage, and showing no mercy. These armies were men only. Why?

There is a basic observation that women have a civilizing effect on men when they are present and there is some kind of relationship. If you have ever gone camping or hunting with your buddies leaving the ladies at home, you know what I am talking about. Men’s behavior among men is much “baser” than when women are present. People expect women to be civil and even nurturers. I could discuss the effect of having women alongside men in the military in the context of the above paragraph but that is for another time.

Now, fast forward to sports of today. Team sports allow people to exhibit antisocial war-like behavior under a carefully constructed set of rules. Deception is allowed, overpowering without mercy is allowed, double teaming is allowed, taunting and humiliation is allowed. It seems to me, that in this being a setting for a mach war, men are acceptable in these antisocial roles more than women. Why people enjoy watching antisocial behavior is another question.

Somehow the image of a woman linebacker clothes-lining as wide receiver does not play as well as if it is a man doing it to another man (penalty flag aside). What seems natural for a man to be doing is unseemly for a woman to be doing.

This is why I do not watch women’s sports. It is a bunch of women trying to act like men and I do not find it entertaining.

Megan Rapinoe is an activist and does not have the discipline to keep her mouth shut. The press is politicized and sees Rapinoe as their opportunity to turn women's soccer into a political statement. The left tries to politicize everything it touches, so this should come as no surprise.

The other players on the team are far less outspoken. They do get interviewed, and interviewers do follow up on the Rapinoe opening and ask leading questions. A couple of players have offered political opinions in response, but they are not activists; they are just soccer players who failed to dodge unfortunate questions. On the other hand, others of the players, per occasional feature reporting, are evangelical Christians. I presume some are politically conservative, though the press doesn't seem interested in interviewing them, just as the press relentlessly pursues the gay angle despite the fact that most of the players are straight, and several are married. Overall, they're a reasonably typical cross section of 20-35 year old American young women who happen to have great athletic ability. Which brings us back to press bias; why does Megan Rapinoe get 20 interviews to every one for Julie Ertz or Morgan Brian? Or Tobin Heath? A rhetorical question, of course: the press is pushing an agenda.

That said, I am getting mightily tired of the Rapinoe sideshow. Just as I got mightily tired of the Hope Solo sideshow before that. Solo was the best goalkeeper in women's soccer for a long time and was a game changer/game winner for the USWNT. Rapinoe is a terrific winger. But the ladies are trying to build a league and make women's soccer the first commercially successful women's team sport. The players would be better advised to keep their personal dramas and politics off the field. Most do. But the press is in the business of generating controversy and will seize any opening it gets.

My biggest frustration with the whole Rapinoe thing, however, is slightly different, and goes to the issue of press bias. Someone fill me in if I've missed it, but in all the Rapinoe furor, has ANY reporter -- just one, anywhere -- asked her about the trans issue? Sure, Rapinoe is gay, out and proud. But today, no one particularly cares about that. Of course there are homosexuals in sports, men's as well as women's. So what? Who cares? And of course Rapinoe is anti-Trump. So what? She should not be bringing her politics onto the field, but she's entitled to her opinion. Her views on Trump are not uncommon. But that shouldn't matter if she'd only just shut up and play soccer, at which she is very good.

The trans issue, however, goes to the basic integrity of women's sports. It's also an issue in which the bullying has reached an extreme, and on which honest discussion would require real courage. But the press won't even raise it. Is there not even one reporter out there who will ask Ms. Megan Outspoken Rapinoe a simple question about her opinion of gender confused men invading women's sports? Martina Navratilova was out and proud long before Rapinoe learned about the birds and the bees. She spoke up and took some flack. Rapinoe should be asked if she stands with Navratilova or if she is willing to sell out women athletes to accommodate mentally ill men. Her answer might carry some weight.

But there is apparently no honest journalist left to ask the question.

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